-SUNITA NARAIN

This budget provides us with seemingly disparate programmes, which when put together could be the needed game changers for India’s green growth

UNION FINANCE Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in her Budget 2023-24 speech announced that the vision of the government is “green growth”,

which is being implemented through programmes for greening of fuel, farming, mobility, buildings and energy access. This, she says, will help reduce carbon intensity of the economy and provide large-scale job opportunities. This year, like never before, there is no coyness about the imperative of energy transition. You may argue that it is still not clear how the budgetary allocation of `35,000 crore for energy transition will be spent. But I believe that this budget provides us with seemingly disparate programmes, which when put together could be the needed game changers.

First, it provides impetus to biogas (produced using animal manure and traditionally promoted in rural India) and its advanced version, compressed biogas (also known as bio-compressed natural gas or bio-CNG). The finance minister has called for an investment of `10,000 crore to set up 300 community- or cluster-based biogas plants and 200 bio-CNG plants; 75 bio-CNG plants will be built in cities. She has accepted that there is a need to

rationalise the cascading taxes on clean fuel and has

mixed with plastic and other dry waste streams because we do not practice segregation at the scale that is needed. So for bio-CNG plants, or for any other project that would process and add value to this “waste”, cities would need to ensure that households segregate garbage, and that city sanitation is designed to transport this segregated wet waste for processing. This is possible.

Indore, which has built India’s first citywide bio-CNG plant, finds that selling the fuel to city buses improves the economics of sanitation management.

A byproduct of bio-CNG plants is fermented organic manure, which can be used as a bio-fertiliser. Taking this bio-CNG project to the next level has some challenges, the most important of which is to ensure standards for compost and fermented organic manure so that this byproduct is utilised and is paid for. This byproduct can ensure that the enormous subsidy to chemical fertilisers is reduced, if not removed.

This is also how the budget’s directional shift to fund desludging of septic tanks—instead of only spending on building underground sewers—can add to the circular economy of waste. The human excreta can be transport-

ed for treatment and

alluded to the possibility of a mandate on all natural and biogas companies to ensure that bio-CNG is bought and marketed. Second, she has provided funds for replace- ment of old and polluting vehicles of the central govern- ment under the vehicle scrappage programme. Third is the budgetary focus on mechanical desludging of septic

then the sludge be reused for manure. Budget 2023-24 says that 10,000 bio-input resource centers will be built

tanks and management of dry and wet waste. Stitch them together, and you understand how the government is taking the idea of circular economy to implementation.

Take the issue of bio-CNG. The government pro- gramme Sustainable Alternatives Towards Automobile Transportation (saTaT) has projects on ground where companies use agricultural residue—largely rice straw, which is burnt by farmers in Punjab and Haryana—and city waste to manufacture bio-CNG. This gas is then used to run vehicles, including city buses. In cities, which are fast losing the battle to handle solid waste, bio-CNG plants can help reinvent waste management.

Our cities are running out of land for dumping waste and do not have the resources to pay for managing the ever-growing volumes of waste. The only option is to make wealth out of waste—which is what the finance minister stresses in her speech. But for the bio-CNG project to work, cities will have to learn the art of segregating waste at source. Bio-CNG plants need high quality organic (or wet) waste. We know that 40-80 per cent of the waste of any city is wet waste, but it gets

for natural farming. It also has a programme to promote alternative fertilisers and “balanced use of chemical fertilisers”, but it does not go far enough to create a level playing field for non-chemical fertilisers. Clearly, this is the agenda for the next budget.

Similarly, the vehicle scrappage programme has huge benefits for both air pollution and decarbonisation of sectors like iron and steel. It needs to be designed deliberately so that the most polluting vehicles—com- mercial vehicles like trucks—are phased out and replaced by much cleaner variants with Bharat Stage (BS) VI emission standards, being manufactured today. The added benefit of this programme is that the steel scrap of the discarded vehicles can be utilised to reduce the carbon emissions of the steel sector. This is, again, a huge game changer, but needs to be done deliberately and at scale to make the difference.

So, Budget 2023-24 provides clear shifts in pro- gramme direction that need to be applauded. The real test will be our ability to operationalise those shifts at speed and at scale. 

-SUNITA NARAIN

We have to recognise that an alternative exists

022: Horrible, just horrible. The year brought the world to its knees. This was when we started with a sliver of hope. After two years of surreal and back- breaking events when the novel coronavirus had shut down our world, we thought the worst was over. The virus had become less virulent; we were in the phase of co-living with it. More comforting, there were vaccines that offered us protective cover, which could control the high mortality rate. The worst, as

I said, was seemingly over. We collectively exhaled. Now, we could rebuild our world.

We hoped that this new phase of reconstruction would be based on the learnings of the past years. We would do things differently, knowing that we need to do more for public health; we would invest in the shattered economies of the poor who were worst hit by the pandemic and lost livelihoods. Our world would be greener, more inclusive and more humane. We had seen the flights of migrant workers from our cities and countries. It was clear that the cost of production could not be discounted anymore when we factored in the real value of work. We also understood the huge opportunity to invest in the rural hinterland so that people who had returned would only leave because of the pull of the city, but not the push of their desperate economic situation. All in all, the horrors and human tragedy had changed us all. We saw the value of humanity and the need for doing more to hold on to this hope. But how quickly all these unraveled.

Transitional offsets

By mid-February, 2022, when Russia invaded Ukraine, our world became more divided, more polarised and deadlier. The eventful year, culminating with the climate conference in Egypt (cop27), had two dominant trends.

One, the energy market was in turmoil.  Europe  learnt that its energy policy had left it dependent on Russia and so deeply vulnerable to this unfolding crisis. Prices of conventional energy have increased so much that the post- War generation of Europeans and Britons, who never witnessed economic hardship and scarcity, is now experiencing the pain of a cold and dark winter. The response of the rich has been to turn again to the sources of energy that they have always depended upon – and which, for a brief moment, they had decided to wean off because of the climate

There is no doubt that the higher cost of energy benefits not just the fossil fuel industry coffers but also makes for a better business case for investment in renewable and clean energy. But we are far from the energy transition that we desperately need and this year has seen us dial back, not dial forward

change crisis. This year, in spite of all the rhetoric and big talk, the already developed world has gone back to “drill baby drill”.

Let’s be clear that even if Europe sticks to its green commitment -notwithstanding it being re-invested in brown energy - it is bad for climate and worse, it is really bad optics. How can the emerging world, that is still in the throes of energy poverty, be asked to move to the costly green transition, when at the drop of a hat, the rich go back to fossil fuels, including restarting coal plants and mines. They can call natural gas green or transitional but the fact is that it is fossil fuel and it needs to be phased out. This part of the world does not have any carbon budget left for the use of fossil fuel, even slightly cleaner natural gas. Let’s also be clear that the idea that these investments (like the opening of UK’s coalmine in Cumbria) are somehow carbon neutral because they invest in “offsets” – in most cases paying for trees to be planted in the parts of the world that are being told to switch off lights – is hogwash, if not downright immoral.

So, this year’s one big trend has been the reversal of gains when it comes to energy transition. Let’s be clear about this and not pussyfoot around with some cute nothings about how renewables are still growing. Yes, there is no doubt that the higher cost of energy benefits not just the fossil fuel industry coffers but also makes for a better business case for investment in renewable and clean energy. But we are far from the energy transition that we desperately need and this year has seen us dial back, not dial forward. This we must remember as we enter a new year. We have to fast forward the change in the coming year.

The second overwhelming trend of 2022 is the impact of climate change. It is now real, in our face and devastating every region of the world. In India, our report “Climate India 2022: An Assessment of Extreme Weather Events January-September” using government data shows that we have seen one extreme weather event a day in the first nine months. This number hides the human face, particularly of the poor, who suffer the worst devastations as they have to cope with repeated damages to their sources of livelihoods. We have to remember this as we move forward to 2023.

This year has been the year of revenge of nature; not a single part of the world has been left unsinged. It tells us that things will only get worse as temperatures continue to rise and we tip over to the catastrophic unknowns. The losses and damages that the developing world is seeing today are attributable to climate change and this, in turn, is because of the stock of greenhouse gas emissions that is in the atmosphere. There is no question about ducking this inconvenient truth.

An order we all want

In the face of these two trends – growing insecurity of the rich and growing vulnerability of the poor – we have seen the worst manifestation of human behaviour. The global community, which till last year, was talking about the need for vaccine cooperation and interdependence, has gone back to shoveling dirt and provocation in others faces. Our leaders want to accentuate the differences, not the common objectives to work together for a secure future.

In 2022, it is confirmed that there are two world orders: the one led by the US and its allies (India is sometimes counted in this), with lofty goals of democracy and free speech; the other, more obviously, authoritarian. In all these, there is the growing influence of a

more aggressive China, which has made gains (in spite of the still raging pandemic and the economic slowdown) on the global stage. Besides, the war for dominance over energy is at full throttle– each block is working to carve out their followers and suppliers of fossil fuels and rare minerals for next-gen production. The race is on and at this moment, China with its eye on materials and technologies seems to be winning. So, not just Ukraine-Russia, the world is now at war.

It is not that the world is divided; we are divided in our minds and thoughts. We do not even know that “another” exists. The media censorship is complete. If you are not with us, you are not in our circle of words

There is also talk of the need for protection of national economies – reversing the free trade bonhomie of the 2000s. But this localisation or de-globalisation is tough in the face of increased cost of production due to higher costs of labour or meeting environmental standards. The world turned itself into a giant consumer of goods when it signed the free trade agreements and now it seems there is no turning back.

But we must. This is the call for 2023. There is even more to be done, than yesterday. Each year that we lose in procrastination is another black mark against our generation. There is no question that climate change impacts will get worse. There is also no question that we need to act at scale and speed to transform economies so that they are future ready. This is where we must focus. This is not a time for war; this is not the age for divisions – even those based on our values and views of the world. We need to have a common minimum programme that brings all countries together on the only issues that matter for humanity: how to avert the existential crisis we face and to build a just and inclusive world order. This is only possible when we go back to a rule-based system of global governance – one that sets rules for the rich and powerful and not just for the poor to abide by. In the case of climate change this means that we must ensure that there are global standards of responsibility that are based on the contribution of gases that all must follow – this will set a level playing field so that old polluters and new polluters are all required to do what is then agreed upon.

Then we need to reorder the financial systems so that there is money available to do development differently. The fact is that the deck is stacked against the emerging world when it comes to investment in cleaner energy sources. There is no money; the cost of finance is high; and high debt burdens mean that many countries pay more than what they even receive in the name of climate gratuity. This cannot go on. But as yet, we are seeing little movement of the needed change of the global financial architecture – not surprisingly as the reformers, the powerful countries and their banks, are the ones who need to be reformed.

The New Year can and must be different. There is no turning away from the urgency of the change that is needed. What will make the difference, I believe, is our ability to speak truth to power – for too long we in civil society have tried to mollycoddle and massage the message to make it more palatable. It is our helplessness that we have accepted all the bad global deals that have been shoved out as the only pragmatic and possible options in the circumstances. This must change. We need to start calling it as it happens. Not because we want to name and shame, but because we deserve better. The second is about our ability to listen to each other. It is not that the world is divided; we are divided in our minds and thoughts. We do not even know that “another” exists. The media censorship is complete. If you are not with us, you are not in our circle of words.

Dissent and dialogue are what we must celebrate in 2023. We will then build that new world that we all so desperately hope is still possible.

As countries reconcile their energy supply options with climate change, will they reinvent the fossil fuel- based system or reinvest in it?

UR ENERGY-guzzling world is on the cusp. It could find a way to leverage the current crisis of energy scarcity and rising prices to reinvent the fossil fuel-based system. Or, it could reinvest in the same carbon-intensive energy system as people in the already rich countries get increasingly desperate for reliable and affordable power to light and heat their homes this coming winter season. It is an important moment in time; one which makes the actions to combat climate change even more contested and urgent.

Let’s be clear that in this moment, the developed countries—I point to them, because these countries have already burnt massive amounts of carbon dioxide for energy to build their economies—are faced with a real energy conundrum. They have already used up their share of carbon space; emissions from the burn- ing of fossil fuels by these countries, first coal and then natural gas and oil, have brought the world to the edge
 
polluting than coal but still a major emitter of carbon dioxide, as "clean". Norway and UK have rebooted their oil and gas drilling; Germany and others in Europe are looking for new suppliers of liquefied natural gas (LNG) from every distant shore and are building infrastruc- ture to pipe and pump it. The US has passed a climate bill (the Inflation Reduction Act), which will invest in renewable energy but conditional to spends on oil and gas in Alaska, Gulf of Mexico and the opening up of millions of hectares of federal land for drilling.

It is no doubt that this legislation is a momentous development—one that would have seemed impossible just a few years ago. The US will, through this, do more than ever before to build a manufacturing base for renewable energy, particularly solar, and will incentivise its use and generously pay households to switch to electric vehicles or cleaner and more insu- lated houses to cut energy bills. Europe, even in this
 
of the precipice. They have said in their many pronouncements that they would move away from fossil fuels to cleaner renewable energy systems, that they would reinvent their energy systems. But the question is will they today, when the rubber has hit the road?

It is a double-punch moment as well. On the one hand, these countries—from Europe to the US—are battered because of a fast-heating planet; temperatures have gone through the roof; droughts and extreme weather events are hitting them as well. They know
 
desperate scramble for gas, is working to ramp up its invest- ment in renewable power. This spend on everything from nuclear to solar, wind and biomass power is also about its energy independence, as it cuts the umbilical cord with foreign energy suppliers.
So, it is the worst of times. It
  
that climate change is a great equaliser and that as emissions stock up in the atmosphere, temperatures will increase and make for an untenable future. On the other hand, ordinary people across Europe are worried, not just because of climate change but because of the lack of energy to heat their homes this coming winter. In the UK, energy prices have spiralled—some say also because of the lack of regulatory control on the domes- tic gas production—and it is making for a tense polity.

In the US, gas prices went up in summer, so much so that people travelled less and consumption of fuel dropped for one climate-friendly moment. But now that prices are down and it is business as usual, the question is if the Joe Biden administration will be able to meet its ambitious climate change goals for 2030.

The fact is that this energy disruption has provided the much-needed vault to the beleaguered fossil fuel industry and has given it a new lease of life. Today, governments have changed their tune; they are asking this industry to dig more; to drill more; to supply more. Europe has baptised natural gas, a fossil fuel less
 
could be the best of times, but there are some caveats. One, this renewed interest in fossil fuels must remain temporary and transient. Given the nature of econo- mies, once the investment has been made in this new infrastructure for LNG terminals or the supply of fossil fuel has increased from new oil and gas discoveries, it will be difficult to wean off.

Two, and this is linked to my first caveat, these countries should not be entitled to more use of fossil fuels in our world of shrunk carbon budgets. They need to reduce emissions drastically and leave whatever little carbon budget space that is remaining to poorer countries to use—this, in real terms, means not using fossil fuels but letting the continent of Africa or countries like India use the available cleaner fossil fuels to drive economies and reduce local air pollution.

It is not just a moral imperative, but a pre-requisite to a world which has a chance to keep the spiralling temperatures under check. This is what we need to keep in mind as countries reconcile their energy supply options with climate change.

-SUNITA NARAIN 
 
WRITE this with considerable anguish. In June, we will come together in Stockholm, marking 50 years of global environmental consciousness. The meet is
to celebrate interdependence and the need for a global compact for planet Earth. But more than ever, such events have virtually become a dialogue among the deaf. The world, it seems, lives on two different planets. There is deep division, polarisation and a lack of understand- ing of each other’s concerns.
Let me tell you what has left me so troubled and has, once again, told me just how much we must learn to listen to each other. As you know, parts of India have been going through an intense, burning heatwave. It has been a living hell in my city Delhi, as temperatures have touched 47˚C. Even as I say this, I know that people like me, who live in relative thermal comfort, are not so badly
 
ocean acidification—reached record levels in 2021.
What, then, are the options? One, provide affordable electricity to all so that people can cope with these temperatures; two, build homes with better insulation and ventilation to improve thermal comfort; three, plant trees for shade; and four, increase storage of water for drinking and irrigation. These will also cool our cities’ microclimate. But there are enormous limitations. There is no way we can live or adapt to the rising temperatures that we are beginning to see. It is also clear that the poor in our world are the ones most impacted by this.
But my anguish is not only because of the dire conditions I see in the world around me. As a climate change activist and environmentalist, it makes me realise that I have failed—we all have failed—to make things better. What rubs salt to the wound is when I get inter-
 
hit. It is the millions who work out in the sun—from farmers to construction workers to all those who cannot afford electricity to even power a fan—are the worst sufferers. They are bearing the brunt of the inferno that has hit work, made people ill, taken lives and burnt and shriveled up part of the wheat crop.
Scientists point out that this time the temperature rise was way too early in the year—in March as against May—making the heat impact more devastating. They connect it to the abnormal behaviour of Pacific Ocean currents, La Niña, which
 
Instead of asking India about its measures to combat the severe heatwave, western media would do well to acknowledge that the richest countries—their countries—are the cause of the problem
 
view calls from western media wanting to find out more about the devastating heat conditions. The most predictable question, after the first few enquiries about life and death, is what is India doing to combat climate change. Then comes the query, why does India continue to use coal for its electricity? And then the final one—this one takes the cake—is to ask (or say) that power demand in this heat will go up, which will mean more burning of coal.
What do I have to say about that?
What can I say?

How do I explain that India’s contribu-
 
have been unusually prolonged, leading to the heat- waves. There is also evidence about changes in the Western Disturbance—the winds from the Mediterra- nean—which are, in turn, influenced by the changes in the Arctic jet stream. The Western Disturbance would bring rain to the Indian subcontinent during this early summer period, reducing the heat’s impact. But this year, the Western Disturbance has been weak. It is still not clear if this is a long-term trend, but what is abso- lutely clear is that there are clear and attributable links between the heatwave and global climate change.

So, things are bad, very bad. It is also certain that we in India must learn to do things differently, knowing that this heat will only get worse. “The State of the Global Climate 2021” report by the World Meteorological Organization, released in May 2022, grimly tells us that the four key indicators of climate change—greenhouse gas (GHG) concentration, sea level rise, ocean heat and
 
tion to GHG emissions is insignificant by any parameter. How do I explain that the stock of emissions in the atmosphere, which is tipping us over and leading to this heatwave, is not of India’s making. How do I explain that we need to discuss reparations and not blame the poor, or even the relatively rich, in India. How do I explain that the global media powerhouses need to get real about the impacts of climate change on countries like India—my country. That we must and will do more to reduce GHG emissions in our own interests, but what we must discuss today is how the richest countries—their countries—are the cause of the problem, and that we must begin to discuss not just how they will reduce emissions at scale but also the need for paying for this loss and damage to the rest of the world. This is the inconvenient truth that is not heard. We can scream, but that part of the world is not listening. This has to change if we want a better world. If we want our world to survive. 

BY SUNITA NARAIN 

Have we learnt the lessons on the impact of burning fossil fuels yet?

Climate change is the result of our demand for energy, we know. Emissions from the burning of fossil fuels, coal, oil and natural gas, are the reason the world is today on the edge of a precipice. The 2022 report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reiterates that the impacts of a warming planet will be catastrophic.

The fact is, not just our world but even the energy market is on a boil — fuel prices skyrocketed even before the Russia-Ukraine war broke out. The question is if this hike in prices will accelerate the move to a greener, cleaner energy future? Or will the governments backtrack and re-invest in the still-reliable fossil fuel energy system? In other words, will this price turbulence give the energy business of the past a new lease of life?

Europe, and Germany in particular, is at the centre of this conundrum. It has invested in renewable energy, but has also relied on the import of natural gas — a cleaner-than-coal fossil fuel — to meet its electricity needs. Roughly 40 per cent of this natural gas comes from Russia. Now the war has jeopardised this supply.

Germany has stopped certification of the already built Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, which would have transported gas under the Baltic Sea from Russia. It is walking a tightrope on its existing gas contracts from Russia.

German chancellor Olaf Scholz issued a statement on March 7, saying that his country and Europe as a whole were dependent on Russia to meet energy needs for heating, mobility and electricity, and so they could not sever these ties in the short term.

But it is also a fact that Europe is under pressure from Ukraine and the United States to do more. On the same day, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said his country was looking to coordinate with European allies on the possibility of banning the import of oil from Russia. This not only spooked the markets, spiking oil prices to over $139 (more than Rs 10,000) a barrel (nearly 159 litres), but is also an indication of things to come as the war escalates.

So now, energy security is at the core of policy — as much as, if not more than, climate change. Germany has decided to invest in building two liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminals so that it can diversify its supply. In this process, Europe has become the new destination for US natural gas companies.

On the other hand, Europe is looking at its investment in renewables — wind and solar — as the “energy of freedom”, giving this clean source an added emphasis. The question is if this disruption in the oil markets will derail the move towards energy transition or speed it up?

It is the same in the United Kingdom, which has set itself up as a climate leader with aggressive reduction targets. But now, ironically, its Committee on Climate Change has cleared the decks to expand oil and gas extraction in the North Sea.

The UK is not as dependent on Russia for its energy supply, but its household energy prices are set to double in April. Its energy regulator has lifted the price cap, which on the back of increased oil and gas prices, will add to the household bills.

So, the UK is worried about the energy poverty of its people and the anger it will lead to. Therefore, at this moment, the government, which preached that developing world should shun coal because of climate change, has decided to re-invest in its own fossil fuel industry. Will efforts to combat climate change then become a casualty of this energy war?

Oil and gas prices have been seeing a high partly because of the two years of COVID-19, when the world saw degrowth like never before. As a result, demand for energy fell; there was under-investment; and new capacity was not added. But then, as the lockdowns were lifted and countries returned to business as usual, energy demand soared. And this led to price hikes.

The war has just added fuel to this fire. But what it has done is build a convenient narrative that the energy transition — pushed as it is because of the urgency to combat climate change — was unplanned and unfeasible; that it has led to large-scale disruptions and will not work. Instead, what is needed is to plan for a transition that it is pragmatic and balanced. This, then, is the logic for the resurgence of the conventional energy business.

There is a difference, of course. This argument is combined with new language of the need to abate emissions from fossil fuels, including the need to invest in methane reduction; carbon capture technologies so that the emissions from refineries can be pumped back into the ground; and in hydrogen as the next-generation fuel.

In this way, the current energy crisis could lead us back to the fossil fuel business, which has been indicted for years for adding emissions to the atmosphere and for jeopardising life on earth as we know it. It seems that we have not learnt the lessons on the impact of burning fossil fuels as yet. And this, at a time when the world is running out of time and carbon space, is indeed something that should worry us enormously.

By Anumita Roychowdhury

The first generation transition from highly polluting two-stroke technology to cleaner technology pathways needed committed industry leadership

It was 1995. We could feel toxic air. But did not quite understand what it was all about. We explored deeper to understand the problem, particularly why our vehicles pollute so much.

We were then just a year away from the first-ever emissions standards for vehicles to be implemented in 1996. There were doubts if the two-wheeler industry would be able to meet the mark.

That was the time when I met Rahul Bajaj, the industry scion and the face of the ‘Hamara Bajaj’ revolution in the country. This was for a conversation for our book Slow Murder: the deadly story of vehicular pollution in India, that had catalysed our Right To Clean Air campaign.

What I found most compelling about the conversation with Rahul Bajaj was his willingness for open discussion and dialogue.

This was a challenging time for the two-wheeler industry. It was also a difficult conversation to conduct.

Two-stroke engines — then powering nearly most of the country’s two- and three-wheeled vehicles, were known for the most inefficient combustion that allowed nearly 25 per cent of fuel to be emitted unburnt, causing 65 per cent of hydrocarbon emissions. The industry was facing two inflexible deadlines of 1996 and 2000 to meet the new norms to fix these gas bombs.

We were concerned about the slow pace of technological progress in this segment. Not taking corrective and adequate technical measures and hard-selling smoke-belching ubiquitous two-stroke engines seemed like an environmental crime.

Bajaj responded in his disarming style. But what Rahul Bajaj said, foreshadowed the unique transition pattern of the two-wheeler industry in the years to come.

He remained candid about “we do produce polluting vehicles.” But he added:

Let me point out that the 1996 norms for two-wheelers are more stringent than the corresponding norms in European countries. The current Taiwanese norms are a little bit more stringent but it must be remembered that Taiwan had met these norms by extensive use of catalytic converters, whereas we have been able to achieve the 1996 norms through more complex technological solutions rather than the relatively simpler but expensive catalytic converters.

The significance of his statement lies in the fact that these affordable, light and easy-to-drive vehicles, unique to poorer countries of Asia and Africa, did not have a reference benchmark for improvement in the developed world of the United States and Europe like cars had during that time. These were not the vehicles of concern in rich countries.

India therefore had to lead and chart its own roadmap in those early years. Europe stepped up much later. We may still be demanding more, but the significant upgrades that followed over the last couple of decades, has virtually killed the two-stroke engines in the Indian market.

‘Hamara Bajaj’, along with the rest of the two-wheeler industry, has led and driven this transition that has reduced emissions significantly from this segment.

Even in those early years, India had the most stringent carbon monoxide limits for this vehicle segment and the nitrogen oxide (NOx) limits that were regulated in combination with hydrocarbons, were beginning to get stricter.

This triggered the corporate policy for phasing out of two-stroke powered two-wheelers from the production line and to move to four-stroke engines with catalytic converters along with optimisation of engine parameters and improvement in ignition systems.

Stricter standards also protected Indian industry against imports as the imported vehicles also had to meet the existing emission regulations of the importing country. This had even blocked the import of the mighty Harley Davidson at that time as those bigger engines could not meet the Indian standard.

Have come a long way since then

As emissions regulations for two-wheelers evolved, the response of the entire two-wheeler industry was catalytic. There was considerable excitement in India when the vehicle industry leapfrogged to Bharat Stage VI (BSVI) emissions standards in 2020. But the public discourse was obsessed only with its impact on cars and heavy duty vehicles.

The deeper changes in the regulations for the two-wheelers that are more technology forcing have remained nearly unnoticed. For the first time in India, NOx and hydrocarbon emissions are being separately measured instead of the earlier practice of combined measurement. This ensures emissions of one pollutant does not increase at the expense of the other while improving emissions control systems.

New models are required to meet tighter evaporative emissions limits and no flexibility is allowed for meeting tailpipe and evaporative emission limits. BSVI two wheelers now have on board diagnostic (OBD) system.

From April 2023 onwards, the OBD II will be capable of monitoring the key parameters that have a bearing on the emissions performance of the vehicles. These include catalytic converters, exhaust gas recycling, misfire detection, and oxygen sensor deterioration. This opens up the opportunity for more advanced technologies and electronics.

The industry has already moved to testing of vehicles for new norms on more improved Worldwide Harmonized Motorcycle Test Cycle (WMTC). In use performance requirements are also expected to come soon. These changes have led to a massive makeover to close loop electronic fuel injection (EFI) systems. The two-stroke engine is now a fossilised dinosaur.

This makeover to BSVI also witnessed strong support from the Bajaj group that had proactively met the standard in 2017. Rajeev Bajaj, the current chief executive and son of Rahul Bajaj, had strongly opposed the auto industry’s call for deferring the new emission norms to dispose off the old vehicle stock.

A much bigger change is awaiting the two-wheeler industry now. At this crossroads, while the internal combustion engines will be pushed harder to meet more stringent benchmarks, the electrification of this segment to meet zero emissions targets will quicken.

Given the current market dynamics and the sharp drop in battery costs and improvement in price parity, NITI Ayog expects an ambitious electrification target for this segment — as much as 70 per cent, by 2030.

In fact, the Government of India signed the Declaration on 100 per cent transition to zero emissions by 2030-2040 at the 26th Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.

India also makes a specific mention — “two-wheelers and three-wheelers constitute more than 70 per cent of global sales and more than 80 per cent in India. All governments should also support the transition of these light vehicles to zero emission vehicles”.

The legacy of the leadership of Rahul Bajaj needs to instil confidence and commitment for the next generation change.

Looking back, I recall his insistence on openness for industry dialogue. He had lamented then that, “the green movement thinks the factory people are all subjective and prejudiced ... there is a lack of communication between the two sides, which is unfortunate.” 

This has to change now. The transformative change that awaits the industry, requires industry leadership and more participation and dialogue on policy levers and fiscal instruments to mobilise support and resources for more committed change for clean air and low carbon pathways. (downtoearth.org.in)

-By Sunita Narain        

Environmental impact assessment has become a convoluted exercise, designed for futility  

Ranking is an instrument to reward the best performers — but more importantly, it signals the best way to do things. So, when the Union Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) says that it will rank the state environmental impact assessment authorities based on the speed at which environmental approvals are given, it basically implies that all it cares about is the “clearance” of projects, not the quality of the assessment or the ability to ensure that the environmental impacts of development projects are mitigated.

You could argue that time taken is not an indicator of the level of scrutiny — and that MoEFCC’s notice is designed only to hold the assessment committees accountable and to ensure that projects are not unnecessarily delayed. But it is not that simple. The fact is this “ranking” is the final nail in the already built coffin of environmental assessments.

Over the past decade or so, government after government has systematically decimated the process of decision-making that would allow for assessment or scrutiny. It is a sham and a farce, and in my view this direction by the ministry — set up to purportedly safeguard environmental interests — has only made its contempt for its self-built process apparent.

Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) started way back in 1994, when development projects were few and the process remained uncontested. The rot took hold from the early 2000s when “building” projects were included in this system of scrutiny.

There is no question that construction, especially large-scale housing, infrastructure or commercial projects, have a massive environmental footprint. They add to water usage, wastewater generation, traffic, and to solid waste.

The problem was the system was never upgraded to handle the huge volume of “building” projects. This led to delays and high transaction costs — corruption, in other words. So in 2006, MoEFCC decentralised, and outsourced the work to states. It replicated the central system at the state level, setting up the state environmental impact assessment authorities. A maze of categories — projects falling into A, B, BI and B2 — were created, with overlaps and a good measure of discretion thrown in.

All in all the quality of scrutiny has not improved and development projects are not more environmentally compliant. EIA has become a convoluted exercise, designed for futility.

Why do I say this? Just consider how fundamentally flawed the process is today. The project proponent is expected to pay consultants to do the EIA, which is based on the terms of reference (ToR) approved by the Central or state environmental impact assessment authority. Category A projects come to the Centre and B go to the state, where the state authority then decides if it is B1 (projects requiring detailed assessments) or B2 (that do not require detailed assessments).

The committee can approve the ToR, ask for more information or reject it. After this, the EIA is done, which, in turn, requires the involvement of at least 12 functional area experts and management and monitoring plans. The draft EIA is in English and its summary in the regional language, which is then put out for public consultation.

A detailed process is in place for holding the public hearing, which would be crucial for “listening” to local objections. Then all this goes to the appraisal committee, which has to scrutinise the draft, ask for more information, and accept it with conditions or reject it.

In actual fact, projects are rarely “rejected”. In our analysis of projects between July 2015 and August 2020, of the 3,100 projects submitted, only 3 per cent were not recommended. Even these would come back with more information.

In this way, proponents are asked — and more so in controversial projects — many times to come back with more data and more clarifications. Finally, the committees “clear” the project, and in most cases, to protect themselves they do so with a fistful of conditions that will never really be monitored. The faceless committees are not held responsible for the project post clearance; their “job” ends with this clearance.

So you really cannot hold them responsible for the quality of the decision taken. The monitoring is then left to the understaffed regional offices of MoEFCC — state pollution control boards are not empowered to monitor impacts as this clearance is done under the Environmental Protection Act and not under the laws governing air or water. In all this, there is duplication, lack of scrutiny and no real intent to ensure that projects are implemented keeping in mind environmental interests.

So, when we defend this broken system of “clearances” it only adds fuel to the fire of the extremely false narrative of environment versus development. In reality, environmental interests have already been given a bypass and development has become mindless, without any regard for what can be done to mitigate and manage harm.

I will discuss, next time, what needs to be done if we are serious about improving decision-making for sustainable development. 

SUNITA NARAIN

Waste-Wise Cities: Best practices in municipal solid waste management

NDIA IS rapidly evolving its policies to deal with garbage—the waste generated from the use of materi- als at homes, institutions and factories. The evolution

must now reflect in our actions. Our “waste” must become a resource—to be reworked, reused and upcycled. This will minimise the use of materials in our world and mitigate environmental damage. It’s a win-win solution.

We know that the “nature” of solid waste changes as societies get richer and urbanise. Instead of biodegradable (wet) waste, households generate more plastic, paper, metal and other non-biodegradable (dry) waste. The quantity of waste generated on per capita basis also increases. Many of the country’s urban areas are already on the trajectory where waste generation has risen exponentially.

In 2000, when the first Municipal Solid Wastes Rules were notified they were based on the idea—prevalent in most countries—that waste had to be collected, transport- ed and then disposed of in secure landfill sites. The objective was to “clean” cities by removing waste from our vicinity. But this policy failed to reflect in practice and the scourge of garbage grew in our cities. What could not be collected or transported because of paucity of municipal services fouled up our neighbourhoods. What was collected got dumped and is today visible as “mountains” of shame.

Over the past few years there has been a rapid shift in the strategy for waste management in the country.

Today’s policy, the Union government’s flagship Swachh Bharat Mission (sBm) 2.0, focuses on source segregation, processing of waste (wet and dry) and on minimising the waste sent to sanitary landfill sites. According to the guidelines of sBm 2.0, only the inert waste and process rejects, which in no case should exceed 20 per cent of the total waste and are not suitable for either dry or wet waste treatment, can be sent to landfill sites. Therefore, the premise of the guidelines is that cities must become

zero-landfill—they must recover and reprocess all waste. The guidelines stress that waste-to-energy (WtE) projects are financially and operationally viable only with an assured minimum input of 150-200 tonnes per day of

non-recyclable, segregated dry waste of high calorific value. This has also been our learning that WtE plants are not the silver bullets they promise to be—incinerating municipal waste to make energy. It

is critical that the waste sent for incineration and energy generation is of high quality and this requires high level of segregation—best done at source. Without this, the plants work below operational capacity and become defunct.

The guidelines also provide an opportunity to reclaim the 3,000-odd landfill sites where, as per the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), some 800 million tonnes of waste is dumped. This will not just free up valuable land, which can be greened and put to suitable use, but also help avert environmental disasters. This requires deliberately designed strategies to reuse the material that is bio-mined from these legacy landfills. Cities must also stop sending new waste to these landfills, otherwise they will get filled up again even while being remediated.

The good news is that India’s solid waste management strategy is now being designed for material recovery and reuse. It is an approach aimed at a truly circular economy. As the strategy demands full reutilisation of materials and no waste, we will learn what we cannot recycle and work towards minimising its use. This will make policy and practice even more environment friendly.

That said, while the policy has evolved, our practice is still to catch up. Source segregation remains our Achilles’ heel—it does not happen at the scale and pace needed.

Even if waste is segregated at the household level, it does not get transported in a segregated manner to processing facilities. In fact, processing happens incidentally, only because there are people who need our waste for their livelihoods—ragpickers, as we call them. City managers are still working through the different options for process- ing this waste and to manage it effectively to generate revenue. Worse, plastic waste—particularly much of the packaging waste—is growing and filling our cities. We still do not acknowledge that much of the “plastic” we use cannot be recycled and so needs to be phased out. The current policy on “single-use” plastics—where certain products have been identified for eventual elimination—is just not good enough to deal with this gigantic problem.

We are in an exciting phase of development, where city managers and leaders are reworking waste strategies.

The Centre for Science and Environment has partnered with the Niti Aayog to document the best practices of “waste-wise” cities as a textbook of new learning and teaching. It is what needs to be practised, and at scale. This is a real opportunity for change. DTE               

We need to move beyond blame game as it masks the need for action

-SUNITA NARAIN 

T’S THAT choking winter for Delhi again. We are frustrated by this recurrence of pollution every year without fail. Nothing seems to change. Nobody
cares. But we must not allow our anguish to be
short-lived so that the real action, which is essential for ensuring our right to clean air, does not get lost.
High-volume acrimony to shift the blame is attention- grabbing, but it will not make the next winter better.
So as we move forward, we must keep in mind three questions. One, why does November continue to be a suffocating month for Delhi and who is responsible for this? Do not we know the cause of the problem?
Two, what has been done till now to combat air pollution and why is it not working? Three, what should be done so that we do not breathe in such toxic levels of pollutants?
First, it’s not rocket science to understand whether the pollution is generated locally,
 
Delhi and vice versa as they share the same airshed. So, pollution management needs a cooperative ap- proach—it needs to be understood that everyone is responsible. We need information on the sources to develop the agenda for action, not to transfer the need to act to someone or something else.
Second, what has been done and why are the measures not working? Let’s be clear that much action has been taken to mitigate air pollution in Delhi. There is a comprehensive, and dynamic, air action plan. It includes action against a particular source of pollution as we get to know more about it. For instance, the recent actions on vehicles—beyond the first-generation transition to compressed natural gas (CNG)—have been to improve the vehicle technology and fuel (Bs-VI); to ensure that trucks, the gross polluters, are charged with a congestion tax so that there is deterrence to
enter the city limits; and the express-
 
comes from neighbouring states or is a combination of both. Take this winter, for instance. A day before Diwali, my colleagues at the Centre for Science and Environment (CsE) put out data

ways have been constructed to provide alternative bypass for this heavy traffic. In addition, to improve public transport, albeit in the future, the Metro Rail’s fourth phase has
 
that the air quality was better than ever before; they attributed this to the late rainfall and good wind speed. Then Diwali was celebrated and crackers were burst. Their impact would have been bearable had the wind continued to blow. But this was also the time when two cyclonic systems were breaking into the country. They led to the formation of anti-cyclonic wind pattern over northern India, including Delhi. The still wind did not allow dispersion of the Diwali smog, which, combined with local pollutants, continued to fill the air. Then came the smoke from stubble burning in neighbouring states—following a delayed paddy harvest because of the rains, farmers had set fire to their fields all at once, desperate to get their field ready for wheat. And it created the toxic cocktail of pollut- ants. Therefore, let’s be clear that there is no one factor for the foul air and there is no point in squabbling over the exact percentage of who is responsible for it.
Now, what are the sources of air pollution in the city? There are two key studies on what is called emission inventory. While the percentages may differ, it is more or less certain that vehicles, industry and power plants, dust and garbage burning are the key sources. It is also clear that pollutants from neighbour- ing districts of Uttar Pradesh and Haryana blow into
 
been partially cleared and high-speed rail is being built to connect neighbouring cities to reduce the need for private transport. The last coal power plant in Delhi has been shut down; the use of coal in industrial sector too has ended. There is no doubt that coal contin- ues to be used in the so-called unauthorised areas of the city and burnt in thousands of small boilers in industrial areas that surround the city limits.
But before we go into the litany of problems, which is essential for the next steps, let’s also understand the impact of what has been done so far.
In the past few years, the number of “satisfactory air” days is up (from 101 in 2018 to 174 in 2020) and more importantly, the number of “severe air” days is down (from 28 in 2018 down to 20 days in 2020). It is not enough, not by a stretch. But the fact is we are bending the curve. Our air is not clean, but it is cleaner on many days of the year. However, much more needs to be done at scale to drive down the pollution levels so that even when air speeds go down, the cold air settles and episodes of high pollution strike—from Diwali to farm fires—we can recover quickly and breathe safely again. The air needs the ability to regenerate itself, even without the advantage of high-speed wind. Let’s discuss this again
air” days is up (from 101 in 2018 to 174 in 2020) and
more importantly, the number of “severe air” days is
down (from 28 in 2018 down to 20 days in 2020). It is
not enough, not by a stretch. But the fact is we are
bending the curve. Our air is not clean, but it is cleaner
on many days of the year. However, much more needs
to be done at scale to drive down the pollution levels so
that even when air speeds go down, the cold air settles
and episodes of high pollution strike—from Diwali to
farm fires—we can recover quickly and breathe safely
again. The air needs the ability to regenerate itself,
even without the advantage of high-speed wind. Let’s
discuss this again. DTE

-सुनीता नारायण

पहले से ही कम उत्सर्जक होने के बावजूद भारत ने जलवायु परिवर्तन से लड़ने की जो प्रतिबद्धता जताई है, उसने बड़े उत्सर्जकों खासकर चीन को उत्सर्जन में कमी के लिए मजबूर कर दिया है

2070 तक शुद्ध शून्य उत्सर्जन (नेट जीरो एमिशन)  हासिल करने की भारत की प्रतिबद्धता से यह साफ है कि बातें बहुत हो चुकी हैं, अब तेजी से काम शुरू कर देना चाहिए।

कॉप 26 में भारत के प्रधानमंत्री नरेंद्र मोदी जलवायु परिवर्तन से निपटने के लिए एक रणनीति की घोषणा की - जिसे उन्होंने पंचामृत कहा है- इसमें शामिल है:  

• भारत 2030 तक अपनी गैर-जीवाश्म ऊर्जा क्षमता 500 गीगावाट तक पहुंचा देगा।
• भारत 2030 तक अपनी ऊर्जा आवश्यकताओं का 50 प्रतिशत नवीकरणीय (रिन्यूएबल) ऊर्जा से पूरा करेगा।
• भारत अब से 2030 तक कुल अनुमानित कार्बन उत्सर्जन में एक अरब टन की कमी करेगा।
• 2030 तक भारत अपनी अर्थव्यवस्था की कार्बन तीव्रता को 45 प्रतिशत से भी कम कर देगा।
• वर्ष 2070 तक भारत नेट जीरो के लक्ष्य को प्राप्त कर लेगा।

भारत के जलवायु परिवर्तन के ये लक्ष्य प्रशंसनीय हैं और अब भारत ने समृद्ध दुनिया के पाले में गेंद डाल दी है कि अब उनकी बारी है। ऐसा इसलिए कहा जा सकता है, क्योंकि ग्रीनहाउस गैस उत्सर्जन में भारत का ऐतिहासिक योगदान नहीं रहा है।

1870 से 2019 तक, भारत का उत्सर्जन वैश्विक कुल के मुकाबले 4 प्रतिशत तक बढ़ा है। हालांकि भारत को 2019 में दुनिया के तीसरे सबसे बड़े प्रदूषक के रूप में जाना गया, लेकिन भारत का कार्बन डाइऑक्साइट उत्सर्जन 2.88 गीगाटन था, वहीं पहले नंबर पर रहे चीन का सीओ2 उत्सर्जन 10.6 गीगाटन था और अमेरिका का सीओ2 उत्सर्जन 5 गीगाटन था। ऐसे में इन देशों से भारत की तुलना नहीं की जानी चाहिए। वह भी जब, जब हमें अपनी अर्थव्यवस्था को विकसित करने और अपने लाखों लोगों की ऊर्जा की जरूरतों को पूरा करने की बहुत आवश्यकता है।

इसलिए, हर कोण से देखा जाए तो हमें अपने कार्बन उत्सर्जन को कम करने के लिए इन वैश्विक लक्ष्यों को नहीं लेना था। यही कारण है कि भारत के लिए इसे हासिल करना न केवल एक चुनौती है, बल्कि दुनिया के लिए भी इसका अनुसरण करना भी एक चुनौती है।

लेकिन, इन महत्वाकांक्षी लक्ष्यों का क्या मतलब है? इस बारे में बात करते हैं -

2030 तक 500 गीगावाट गैर-जीवाश्म ईंधन ऊर्जा क्षमता: क्या भारत इस लक्ष्य को पूरा करेगा
भारत के केंद्रीय विद्युत प्राधिकरण (सीईए) ने 2030 के लिए देश के ऊर्जा सम्मिश्रण के लिए एक अनुमान  लगाया है। इसके अनुसार, बिजली उत्पादन के लिए गैर-जीवाश्म ऊर्जा की भारत की स्थापित क्षमता (सौर, पवन, जलविद्युत और परमाणु) 2019 में 134 गीगावाट थी, जो 2030 तक 522 गीगावाट हो जाएगी।

इसके लिए सौर ऊर्जा की स्थापित क्षमता को 280 गीगावाट और पवन ऊर्जा को 140 गीगावाट तक जाने की आवश्यकता होगी।

इसके अनुसार 2030 तक कुल स्थापित क्षमता 817 गीगावाट और बिजली उत्पादन 2518 अरब यूनिट होगा।

सीईए के इस अनुमान को देखते हुए भारत 2030 तक अपनी 500 गीगावाट गैर-जीवाश्म ईंधन ऊर्जा क्षमता को पूरा कर सकता है। 

भारत अक्षय ऊर्जा से 50% ऊर्जा आवश्यकताओं को पूरा करेगा: भारत कोयला स्रोत में निवेश नहीं करने का इरादा रखता है
सीईए के अनुसार, 2019 में भारत अपने बिजली उत्पादन का 9.2 प्रतिशत अक्षय ऊर्जा से पूरा कर रहा था। 2021 तक, अक्षय ऊर्जा क्षमता में 102 गीगावाट की वृद्धि के साथ उत्पादन लगभग 12 प्रतिशत तक बढ़ गया। इसका मतलब है कि हमें 2030 तक 50 प्रतिशत बिजली उत्पादन लक्ष्य को पूरा करने के लिए इसे बढ़ाने की आवश्यकता है।

2030 में भारत की बिजली की आवश्यकता 2518 अरब यूनिट होने का अनुमान है और यदि हम अक्षय ऊर्जा से अपनी 50 प्रतिशत आवश्यकताओं को पूरा करने का लक्ष्य रखते हैं, तो स्थापित क्षमता को 450 गीगावाट से बढ़ाकर 700 गीगावाट करना होगा। यदि हम जलविद्युत को नवीकरणीय ऊर्जा का हिस्सा मानते हैं - जैसा कि विश्व स्तर पर माना जाता है - तो हमें नई अक्षय ऊर्जा की क्षमता को बढ़ाकर 630 गीगावाट करने की आवश्यकता होगी। यह निश्चित रूप से हासिल किया जा सकता है।

2030 के लिए भारत ने जो लक्ष्य तय किया है, उसे हासिल करने के लिए भारत को अपनी कोयला आधारित ऊर्जा पर रोक लगानी होगी। वर्तमान में, लगभग 60 गीगावाट क्षमता के कोयला ताप विद्युत संयंत्र निर्माणाधीन या पाइपलाइन में है। सीईए के अनुसार, 2030 तक भारत की कोयला क्षमता 266 गीगावाट हो जाएगी, जो निर्माणाधीन 38 गीगावाट के अतिरिक्त हैं। इसका मतलब है कि भारत ने कहा है कि वह इससे आगे अब नए कोयला संयंत्रों में निवेश नहीं करेगा।

भारत 2021-2030 तक अनुमानित कार्बन उत्सर्जन में 1 अरब टन की कमी करेगा: यह भी संभव है, साथ ही इसका पालन करने की चुनौती भी दुनिया को दी गई है
भारत का वर्तमान कार्बन डाइऑक्साइड (सीओ2) उत्सर्जन (2021) 2.88 गीगा टन है। पिछले दशक 2010-2019 में परिवर्तन की औसत वार्षिक दर के आधार पर सेंटर फॉर साइंस एंड एनवायरमेंट (सीएसई) ने एक अनुमान लगाया था, जिसके अनुसार यदि सब कुछ सामान्य रहता है, तब 2030 तक भारत का कार्बन डाइऑक्साइड उत्सर्जन 4.48 गीगाटन होगा। इस नए लक्ष्य के अनुसार, भारत अपने कार्बन उत्सर्जन में 1 अरब टन की कटौती करेगा। यानी कि 2030 में हमारा उत्सर्जन 3.48 गीगाटन होगा। इसका मतलब है कि भारत ने अपने उत्सर्जन में 22 फीसदी की कटौती करने का महत्वाकांक्षी लक्ष्य रखा है।

प्रति व्यक्ति की दृष्टि से:  भारत का प्रति व्यक्ति सीओ2 उत्सर्जन 2.98 टन होगा और इस नए लक्ष्य के अनुसार यह 2.31 टन प्रति व्यक्ति होगा। यदि आप दुनिया से इसकी तुलना करें, तो 2030 में अमेरिका का प्रति व्यक्ति सीओ2 उत्सर्जन 9.42 टन, यूरोपीय संघ का 4.12, कॉप-26 का आयोजन कर रहे देश यूनाइटेड किंगडम का 2.7 और चीन का 8.88 टन होगा।

आईपीसीसी के अनुसार, 2030 में वैश्विक सीओ2 उत्सर्जन 18.22  गीगाटन होना चाहिए ताकि दुनिया तापमान में 1.5 डिग्री सेल्सियस की वृद्धि से नीचे रहे। यदि हम 2030 में वैश्विक जनसंख्या को लेते हैं और इसको विभाजित करते हैं, तो इसका मतलब होगा कि 2030 में पूरी दुनिया का सीओ2 2.14 टन प्रति व्यक्ति होना चाहिए। भारत इस लक्ष्य तक पहुंच रहा है। ऐसे में पूरी दुनिया को 2030 में जाने के लिए प्रतिबद्ध होना चाहिए।

कार्बन बजट के संदर्भ में:  2 नवंबर, 2021 को घोषित नई राष्ट्रीय प्रतिबद्धता भागीदारी (एनडीसी) के तहत अब भारत आईपीसीसी के 400 गीगाटन कार्बन बजट का 9 प्रतिशत हासिल कर लेगा। आईपीसीसी का यह कार्बन बजट 2030 तक 1.5 डिग्री सेल्सियस का लक्ष्य हासिल करने के लिए रखा गया है। साथ ही, इसका लक्ष्य इस दशक (2020-30 तक) में विश्व उत्सर्जन का 8.4 प्रतिशत और 1870-2030 के बीच विश्व उत्सर्जन का 4.2 प्रतिशत हासिल करना भी है।

कार्बन की तीव्रता में 45% की कमी : भारत को इसे हासिल करने के लिए काफी काम करना होगा
कार्बन की तीव्रता (इंटेंसिटी) अर्थव्यवस्था के विभिन्न क्षेत्रों के सीओ2 के उत्सर्जन को मापती है और मांग करती है कि अर्थव्यवस्था के बढ़ने पर इन्हें कम किया जाए। सीएसई के अनुसार, भारत ने 2005-2016 के बीच सकल घरेलू उत्पाद की उत्सर्जन तीव्रता में 25 प्रतिशत की कमी हासिल की है और 2030 तक 40 प्रतिशत से अधिक हासिल करने की राह पर है।

लेकिन इसका मतलब यह है कि भारत को परिवहन क्षेत्र, ऊर्जा आधारित औद्योगिक क्षेत्र, विशेष रूप से सीमेंट, लोहा और इस्पात, गैर-धातु खनिज, रसायन से उत्सर्जन को कम करने के लिए अधिक उपाय करने होंगे।

इसके लिए भारत को अपनी परिवहन व्यवस्था को सुदृढ़ करने की भी आवश्यकता होगी, ताकि हम वाहनों को नहीं, बल्कि लोगों को एक से दूसरी जगह स्थानांतरित कर सकें। इसके लिए हमारे शहरों में सार्वजनिक परिवहन सेवाओं में वृद्धि करनी होगी। इसके अलावा हमारे आवास की ताप क्षमता में भी सुधार करना होगा। वह सब हमारे हित में है।

2070 तक नेट जीरो: यह लक्ष्य विकसित देशों और चीन को अधिक महत्वाकांक्षी होने की चुनौती देता है
आईपीसीसी के अनुसार 2030 तक वैश्विक उत्सर्जन आधा होना चाहिए और 2050 तक नेट जीरो (शुद्ध शून्य) तक पहुंच जाना चाहिए । चूंकि दुनिया में उत्सर्जन में भारी असमानता है, इसलिए ओईसीडी देशों को 2030 तक नेट जीरो का लक्ष्य हासिल करना है, जबकि चीन को 2040 और भारत और बाकी दुनिया को 2050 तक इस लक्ष्य तक पहुंचना होगा। हालांकि, नेट जीरो के लक्ष्य न केवल असमान हैं बल्कि महत्वकांक्षी भी नहीं हैं। इसके अनुसार ओईसीडी देशों ने नेट जीरो का अपना लक्ष्य 2050 और चीन ने 2060 घोषित किया है।

इसलिए, भारत का 2070 का नेट जीरो का लक्ष्य इसका ही विस्तार है और इसके खिलाफ तर्क नहीं दिया जा सकता है। हालांकि, यह संयुक्त नेट जीरो लक्ष्य दुनिया को 1.5 डिग्री सेल्सियस तापमान वृद्धि से नीचे नहीं रख सकता है। इसका मतलब है कि ओईसीडी देशों को 2030 तक अपने उत्सर्जन में कमी लानी होगी।

सबसे महत्वपूर्ण बात यह है कि चीन, जिसका शेष बजट के 33 प्रतिशत पर कब्जा है, उसे इस दशक में अपने उत्सर्जन में भारी कमी करने के लिए कहा जाना चाहिए। अकेला चीन इस दशक में 126 गीगाटन उत्सर्जन करेगा। 

भारत ने ऊर्जा क्षेत्र में बड़े पैमाने पर परिवर्तन को  स्वीकार किया है, जिसे भविष्य के लिए डिजाइन किया जाएगा और यह नए जलवायु परिवर्तन लक्ष्यों के अनुरूप होगा। लेकिन जो बड़ा मुद्दा हमें चिंतित करने वाला है। वह, यह कि हमें यह सुनिश्चित करना होगा कि विकास समान हो और अपने ऊर्जा लक्ष्यों को हासिल करने के लिए देश में गरीबों को उनके अधिकारों से वंचित न किया जाए। क्योंकि हमारे यहां बड़ी संख्या में ऐसे लोग हैं, जिन्हें अभी भी अपने विकास के लिए ऊर्जा की आवश्यकता है। अब, भविष्य में, जैसा कि हमने खुद को प्रदूषण के बिना बढ़ने का लक्ष्य निर्धारित किया है, हमें गरीबों के लिए स्वच्छ, लेकिन सस्ती ऊर्जा उपलब्ध कराने पर काम करना चाहिए।

चूंकि कार्बन डाइऑक्साइड ऊपर पहुंच कर वातावरण में जमा हो जाता है और औसतन 150 से 200 साल तक रहता है। और यही उत्सर्जन तापमान को बढ़ाने में अपनी भूमिका निभाता है। भारत ने अब इस बोझ को आगे नहीं जोड़ने के लिए प्रतिबद्धता जताई है।

पहले से ही औद्योगिकीकरण की चपेट में आ चुकी पूरी दुनिया और खासकर चीन को प्रकृति का कर्ज चुकाना चाहिए। ऐसे में, प्रधानमंत्री मोदी का यह कहना सही है कि इसके लिए बड़े पैमाने पर फंड की आवश्यकता पड़ेगी। यह विडंबना ही है कि जलवायु परिवर्तन के लिए अब तक जो फंडिंग भी हुई है या हो रही है, वह पारदर्शी  नहीं है और उसका सत्यापन भी नहीं होता।

-By Sunita Narain

This heatwave is not a weather blip; illustration: Ritika Bohra

Searing heat, touching 50 degrees Celsius in the otherwise cold regions of Canada and in the western regions of the United States, has brought home the message — once again and loudly — that climate change is here and is about to get worse.

The heat was so unbearable and off the charts that it killed an estimated 500 people in Canada’s British Columbia province. Then there are reports of the savage damage it has done to animals and other creatures. The inferno is now adding to the challenge of wildfires, threatening lives and properties.

Europe is seeing a similar heatwave; it is predicted that this year’s temperatures will be the highest since records have been kept. Yet another year when we have broken the previous year’s heat record! 

The fact is this heatwave is not incidental or accidental — a mere weather blip. Scientists working with the World Weather Attribution initiative conclude that this heatwave “was virtually impossible” without human-caused climate change. They find that the temperatures were so extreme that they lie outside the range of historically observed heat records. They conclude that the frequency of this once-in-a-thousand-year event would increase with temperature rise, and when the world touches 2°C increase over pre-industrial ages, it would become a five- to 10-year event. 

What then is clear is this: One, climate change is happening faster than expected and we are certainly unprepared. Two, climate change is a great leveller — extreme and variable rain, increased frequency of tropical cyclones and heat and cold are hitting the world’s poorest. Each event cripples them and makes them even more vulnerable and marginalised. But the rich are also not excluded from this revenge of nature. The death of people from heatwaves in Canada must keep reminding us of the tragedy that awaits everyone.

Even as I write this, perhaps for the umpteenth time (my readers must forgive me), we have still not seen the writing on the wall. Our actions still do not match our words. The technologies to combat climate change are available — but they require application at a disruptive and transformative scale. This is what we are missing. 

I say this because every extra day of procrastination will make the task even more difficult. Take the case of rising heat. To adapt and survive, the rich in otherwise temperate regions will now invest more in devices like air conditioners to cool their homes. This will, in turn, add to the energy demand and, given that countries are still fiddling around with fossil fuel-based electricity, it will add to greenhouse gas emissions.

We know that heating and cooling devices take up the bulk of the power demand in our cities today. In Delhi, research by my colleagues at the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) shows as soon as the temperature crosses 27-28°C, the cooling demand increases exponentially — electricity demand rises by 190 MW for every degree rise in mercury. With more electricity generation, there will be more emissions, increasing the temperatures even more. The vicious cycle will spiral out of control.

This direct relationship between heat and energy has another dimension to it — thermal comfort or discomfort. This is not just about temperatures but also about how well-designed and ventilated our living spaces are. This is why even when temperatures are not so high, but there is humidity or lack of air, we feel uncomfortable and “hot”. The fan makes air conditioner more efficient as it evaporates moisture from our bodies.

It is about cooling but also about design. Just consider how traditional buildings were designed to keep out the heat; by designing for the sun and wind, and not against nature. They used orientation and shades on window — what we now call passive architecture — to ensure that buildings are protected from the glare; they used courtyards and open windows for ventilation. Trees provided shade, as much as other environmental benefits.

Sadly, modern architecture built on glass facades and closed spaces for air cooling has shunned and dismissed this knowledge as unnecessary and backward.

Then there is also the fact that more heat will add to water stress — for irrigation, for drinking and for fighting forest fires. As we pump more water from the ground or use electricity for transporting water, we will need more energy — further reinforcing the vicious cycle. This is why we must go back to finding ways of optimising local water resources; harvesting the rain where and when it falls so that we can reduce dependence on pumped- and energy-dense water. 

In the heating planet, this knowledge of living with extreme heat and cold without increasing the energy footprint of our living spaces and cities will be crucial. So, as much as we need to move away from fossil fuels, we need to make sure we can do much more with much less energy — this is the climate change challenge. The scorched world should teach us this. (downtoearth.org.in)

-Sunita narayan 

What we need is an evergreen revolution that secures livelihood, provides for energy security and combats climate change

CELEBRATING WORLD Environment Day in the time of an ongoing horrific health pandemic is difficult
to contemplate. In this time of immense human grief and loss, what does the environment even count for?
But take a moment to reflect. The most important element that we gasped for in the past month was
oxygen. Think of the hours and days we spent finding oxygen for our loved ones; how we saw patients collapse and
die because hospitals did not have oxygen in the tanks; how the courts stepped in to regulate the transportation of
oxygen from industries across the country; how we learnt about the business of oxygen concentrator—a machine
that sucks in air and gives us oxygen on demand. Our desperation cannot be recounted without pain. We saw the
gasp for each breath—and just how precious it is. This then is what we must remember this World Environment
Day. The oxygen that we get from nature is about increasing green cover and ensuring that our air—our every
breath—is not polluted. Something we talk glibly about and yet discount with our next move.
The theme of this year’s World Environment Day, celebrated every year on June 5, is ecosystem restoration.
Increasing the tree density and repairing the ecosystem health means the world will sequester carbon dioxide—
that is filling up our atmosphere and leading the world to an inexorable downward spiral of climate change
impacts—and release oxygen. It’s a win-win. But what we need to understand is that planting trees or restoring
ecosystems will require us to first restore our relationship with nature and society.
The fact is trees are about land—who owns it; who protects and regenerates it, and who has the rights over the
produce. In India, the forest department has the “ownership” of vast areas of common forest land. But countries
like India do not have “wilderness”. Instead, we have habitats where people coexist with wild animals in forests.
These are the same forest districts classified as the most backward and poorest. It is also a fact that using all the
legal and administrative, and sometimes, muscle power, the country’s forest
department has kept the tree cover somewhat intact. It works hard every day to
keep people and their animals out. It shuffles files between the bottom rung of
guards and the top bureaucrats to minimise the cutting of trees for “development”
projects—from mining to dams.
But “growing” trees needs people to take ownership of its management; so
that livestock is kept out; so that the saplings survive. More importantly, trees
have a value—whether for their ecosystem services or for timber—which needs
to be paid to the grower. This would then make for a tree-based renewable future—where timber can be used for
making houses and wood for generating energy. This will be an evergreen revolution that puts money in the hands
of the poor; secures livelihoods; and at the same time provides for energy security and combats climate change.
Today the entire world is talking about nature-based solutions—what I have described above—but without
putting the poor community at the centre of the solution. The reason is not difficult to understand. It is about the
political economy of land tenure; the power of the most voiceless and marginalised; and about the cost of growing
trees when people matter. In this scheme the value of land and labour needs to be paid for, not in terms of the
cheapest options for mitigating carbon dioxide from the air but in terms of livelihoods that this solution will
provide. This will make the entire idea of buying cheap carbon offsets unfeasible.
Then, of course, there is the challenge when with every breath we inhale poison and not oxygen. We discuss
this every year, when winter comes and the pollution gets trapped in the heavy air and moisture. We feel it then.
We scream. But then we forget. So, just as winter ended this year, the Indian government decided to change the
rules for coal-based thermal power plants to give them a licence to pollute. Simply, it said, you can pay for noncompliance
and this penalty will be lower than what you would spend on pollution control equipment. The rules
are oxygen for the power companies and death by breath for the rest of us.
The fact is our oxygen cannot be secured in a cylinder or by an oxygen concentrator machine that I suspect
every rich Indian household will now buy and keep. It cannot even be secured by the air purifier that we already
have bought and installed in our houses and offices. Instead, oxygen needs us to value it as the most important
and critical life-support system of our world. So, this World Environment Day, when the ravages of the pandemic
have left us angry and shattered, let’s not beat around the bush any more. We know today, more than ever before,
that talking the talk does not save lives. We need to walk the talk. The oxygen in this battle for a greener and
more inclusive tomorrow is our common anguish—this is our fight for survival. Nothing less.  (downtoearth.org.in) DTE @sunitanar 

By Sunita Narain

We now need to be more than obsessive about water and its management as it is the basis of health and wealth

                                                                                             
Every year, March 22 is observed as the World Water Day. This year as we celebrate, and reiterate, the importance of water we need to remember the difference — this is the World Water Day in the age of climate change.

This means we have to do everything that we know we need to do: Augment water availability by harvesting every drop of rainwater; use it much more efficiently so that every drop of that rainwater is valued in the food we eat or the water we flush; and ensure that every drop of that used water is reused and recycled and not degraded by pollution. This we already know and we practice.

But this will not be enough in the age of climate change — we will have to do all we know at a faster pace, on a massive scale, and differently. Why do I say this?

We know that climate change impacts are about heat — increased and scorching temperatures — and about variable and extreme rain. Both have a direct correlation with the water cycle. So climate change mitigation has to be about water and its management.

Every year, we know now, is the hottest year in recorded history — till the next year comes around and breaks the record. In India, temperatures in parts of Odisha have crossed 40 degree Celsius as early as February — even before summer set in. North Indian states are breaking all records in terms of rising heat and higher than normal temperatures.

And this is when 2021 is the year of La Niña — the Pacific water currents that are known to bring cooler temperatures globally as compared to El Niño. But Indian weather scientists say global warming has offset this cooling effect of La Niña.

Rising heat has many implications for water security. First, it means that there will be greater evaporation from all waterbodies. It means that we need to work not just on storing water in millions of structures, but also plan for reducing losses due to evaporation. One option is to work on underground water storage — wells in other words.

India has for too long discounted the management of groundwater systems as irrigation bureaucracies have been built on the planned canals and other surface water systems. But this will need to shift in this age of climate change and water scarcity.

We need to find ways of reducing losses from tanks, ponds and canals as well. It’s not that evaporation losses didn’t happen in the past; but now the rates will increase with temperatures soaring. So we need to plan; we need to do more.

Second, increased heat means that it will dry up the moisture in soils; it will make the land dusty and will increase the need for irrigation. In a country like India where the bulk of the food is still grown in rainfed regions — irrigated by rain — it will intensify land degradation and dust bowl formations. This means water management must go hand in hand with vegetation planning to improve the ability of soils to hold water, even in times of intense and prolonged heat.

Thirdly, and obviously, heat will drive up the use of water — from drinking and irrigation to fighting fires in forests or buildings. We have already seen devastating forest fires rage in many parts of the world, and in the forests of India. This will only increase as temperatures go up. So the demand for water will increase with climate change, making it even more imperative that we do not waste — either water or wastewater.

But this is not all. The fact is that climate change is already showing up in terms of the increasing number of extreme rain events. This means that we can expect rain to come as a flood, making the cycle of floods followed by droughts even more intense. India already has fewer rainy days in a year — it is said that it rains for just 100 hours on average in a year. Now the number of rainy days will further go down, but extreme rainy days will increase.

This has a huge impact on our plans for water management. This means that we need to think more about flood management, not only to embank rivers but to optimise the floodwaters so that we can store them in underground and overground aquifers — wells and ponds. But it also means that we need to plan differently for the capture of rainwater.

Currently, our water structures, the many millions that are being constructed under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, for instance, are designed for normal rainfall. But now, as extreme rains become the normal, the structures will need to be redesigned so that they last over the seasons. The bottom-line is that we must plan deliberately to capture every drop, not just of rain but of floodwater, in this age of climate change.

Let’s then be clear; we needed to be obsessive about water and its management yesterday because water is the basis of health and wealth. But now we need to be more than obsessive — we need to be determined and deliberate. This is the real make or break of our future. (downtoearth.org.in)

Though the US is no longer addicted to coal, it is completely sold on the idea of cheap energy, writes Sunita Narain

-Sunita Narain

It’s time to exhale. Donald Trump is now a former US president. President-elect Joe Biden and his vice president-elect, Kamala Harris, have stated they will rejoin the Paris Agreement on climate change.

So denial of this existential threat to the Planet is now past. And we can move decisively on actions. Or, so we hope.

This is where we need a dose of realism. I am not undermining the Biden-Harris triumph, but reminding us of the troubled paths ahead. The world is hurtling down to a climate change-led catastrophe. We cannot afford coy and small answers.

This is where introspection of the Biden-Harris victory must start. The fact is they won, but Trumpism did not lose. What is shocking to most of us, watching from the outside, is that close to half of America voted for him.

He got more votes in 2020 than in 2016, notwithstanding his failure in managing the uncontrolled pandemic, his rejection of climate change and his exacerbation of race and gender conflicts. We need to remember this.

The United States is a divided nation and the deep rift has its foundations on what nearly half of the American people want. You can say Biden-Harris won because they said they would control the virus; they would listen to scientific advice on the need to wear masks; and, impose lockdowns when necessary.

But it is also a fact that people voted for Trump because they did not want any of these. They believe the economy is more important than the virus. You can argue that the virus does not discriminate, but it hits poor people more. But they are not listening.

Let’s also be clear that, more than ever before, this US election had climate change denial or action on the ballot. It was an issue that was on the table — Trump made sure of that. He was belligerent about his opposition to this “fake” science.

He swore by coal and, more importantly, he pushed his country to manufacture more: made in the USA was his slogan. Pushing against climate change — in spite of the terrible fires and hurricane damages — was his way of putting the economy above everything else. His people saw this.

We need to take off our rose-tinted glasses that shows ‘all is well’. The US has always been a renegade nation as far as climate action is concerned — the abysmally insignificant targets it has set for itself under the Paris Agreement are a testimony to this.

It is of course another matter that Biden-Harris will, at least, do something and not work against action. But this is only because Trumpism took us down to depths that we never imagined before.

It is also a fact that Trump is right (and completely wrong) on one thing. He says his country’s energy emissions were lowest during his term; this is right. The US energy sector’s emissions declined by a massive 30 per cent in the past decade.

The shift was primarily because market factors moved the power sector away from coal to shale and natural gas. In the last year alone, coal-fired power generation fell by 18 per cent, according to data from private research firm, Rhodium Group. This is where the good news ends.

The fact is that cheap shale gas took off where coal left — and it left behind the renewable energy surge as the cost of gas has fallen to a record low.

It is no wonder then that Biden has strayed off the New Green Deal agenda of his deputy to argue that he will not stop fracking of gas on private lands, where the bulk of the gas is found.

The bigger problem is that other sectors of the US economy are now reversing gains made from the transition from polluting coal. The transportation sector has overtaken energy emissions and industrial sector emissions have grown.

The bottom line is that even though US emissions fell by some 2 per cent in 2019 and there was a cumulative decline of 12.3 per cent on its 2005 baseline, the country is still way off the mark to meet its targets.

By the Copenhagen Accord target it signed, the US agreed to be 17 per cent below 2005 levels by the end of 2020; and as per the Paris Agreement, 26-28 per cent below 2005 levels by 2025. In fact, net US greenhouse gas emissions in 2019 were higher than at the end of 2016 — the beginning of the Trump presidency.

What should concern us is that further decline will be hard. This is not only because of the increase in Trump’s vote share; it is because there are no easy answers for rapid and transformational emission cuts in the country.

Though the US is no longer addicted to coal; it is completely sold on the idea of cheap energy. It also wants to reclaim its role as the economic powerhouse — take back its position from China.

This will mean burning more fuel for industrial growth and using more energy that will negate all the gains of cleaner fuels. This, when we need transformational answers. So, let’s not kid ourselves that all will be well now that Biden-Harris are in power. We need to push more and force them to run, and not walk, the talk. (downtoearth.org.in)

Straw can be converted into fuel for use in vehicles. It can also replace coal in old power plants, reducing environmental costs 

-Sunita Narain

Should farmers get paid for not burning their fields? This is an extremely contentious issue today as the northern Indian region stares at another winter, when stubble is burnt in fields and winds bring the pollution to cities like Delhi — already choking from the spit of vehicles and local sources of pollution. The logic behind this is that rewarding farmers with cash would dissuade them from burning their fields.  

My logic, as an environmentalist and campaigner for clean air, is that this will be a perverse incentive. In other words, it will get easily abused so that there is more stubble burning as there will be the promise of the reward; and each year the amount of the reward will have to be raised. The incentive will become the perverse reason for doing what is clearly wrong. But, I am being screamed at in social media platforms; the taglines being that “I am elitist, ignorant, out of touch with reality” and, of course, “anti-farmer”.

That said, it is a fact when the reward was given last year — the Punjab government disbursed some Rs 29 crore to 31,231 farmers — the number of stubble fires actually went up from the previous year. But that is not even the point.

Farmers need assistance — there is no question about that. I am not even talking about the larger problem of agrarian distress, where farmers are caught in the pincer between high prices of inputs as against the need to depress food prices for consumers. This system that discounts the labour of farmers ends up discounting their soil and water systems as well. It needs to be fixed.

We need to recognise the problem and find the way ahead — one that provides income to farmers and improves environmental sustainability.

We know farmers burn stubble because they have a short period between when they harvest paddy and when they have to sow the next wheat crop. We also know that this period has been shortened because the government has notified a delay in planting paddy — postponed by roughly a month so that it is planted closer to when the monsoon arrives in the region; all this has been done so that farmers do not overexploit groundwater.

You can argue that farmers should not plant paddy in these water-scarce regions. You would be correct. But the answer is complicated as governments procure paddy with an assured minimum support price (MSP).

Farmers then are caught in the pernicious pecuniary trap — the stubble of basmati paddy is not burnt as it can be used for fodder. But basmati paddy is not under MSP because it can be traded internationally. So, farmers still grow non-basmati paddy for MSP and then have no alternative but to burn the stubble. They choke, we choke.

The answer then is three-fold: One, use machines to plough back the straw into the ground and do so without impinging on the time that is needed for sowing the wheat crop. But these agricultural equipment are expensive (they were not available also till a few years back). So, in the past two years, the Union government has provided funds so that state governments can procure these machines and make them available to farmers at no cost or at minimal cost of operation.

By the beginning of stubble-burning season 2020, in Punjab alone, some 50,000 machines had been given at 80 per cent subsidy to custom hiring centers and to individual farmers. Tilling biomass back into the ground would also improve soil fertility.

The second part of the solution is to provide value to the biomass — farmers will not burn if they can be paid for the straw. There is huge potential here — from generating power to using straw to make compressed biogas (CBG). Much is happening here as well. The first CBG project should go online by early 2021; many more are in the pipeline.

Last month, the Reserve Bank of India included CBG in its list of priority sector lending; the State Bank of India has circulated a loan scheme; and, oil companies have agreed on a buy-back rate of Rs 46 per kilogramme for five years. So, straw burnt today, will be converted into fuel for use in vehicles.

Then there is also the option of using straw to replace coal in old power plants — this would not only help to extend the life of the built infrastructure, but will also reduce environmental costs.

The third option is to wean farmers away from growing paddy and to diversify their cropping options. This, obviously, is more challenging but needs to be done.

The fact is that we need to do much more to provide real options to farmers. For instance, they could be paid for their ecosystem service of soil organic carbon sequestration. But all this needs to be done in ways that it builds the foundation for doing what is right. (downtoearth.org.in)

Mathematician Eugina Cheng speaks to DTE on her new theory of people that doesn’t look at world as a dichotomy between genders, as well as the need to un-gender our vocabulary 

By Anshika Ravi

The world is often viewed through simplistic concepts of ‘masculinity’ and ‘femininity’ that pit men and women against each other. This linking of behaviour with gender furthers gender-based inequality.

Now a mathematician has proposed a new way to look at things: Decoupling behaviour from gender. Eugina Cheng, mathematician and Scientist In Residence at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, proposes, in her book x+y: A Mathematician’s Manifesto for Rethinking Gender, the Category Theory. It describes “things by the role they play in a context, rather than by their intrinsic characteristics”.

The theory takes relationships among individuals as the base and builds itself around the idea that biological descriptions can, and should be, unhinged from how we view those relationships.

She suggests a rebranding of vocabulary used to call out the bias and suggests two behaviour models: ‘Ingressive’ and ‘congressive’. While ingressive behavior focuses on oneself over society / community and is competitive; congressive is accommodating and collaborative.

Cheng admits that the former is highly rewarded, but vouches for the latter. In a conversation with Down to Earth, Cheng talks about her ‘theory of people’ and how to rethink notional gender differences. Edited excerpts:

Anshika Ravi: We have looked at gender through the prism of multiple disciplines — sociology, psychology, physiology, biology etc. What prompted you to examine it through mathematics?

Eugina Cheng: I am a mathematician and I always seek ways in which I can use my expertise to help the world in any way I can. Mathematical thinking is my instinctive way to think about everything.

Even when I do not direct apply maths, I often use the discipline of mathematical thinking. As a woman in the male-dominated field of maths, it was natural for me to think about gender issues through the lens of mathematical thinking as well.

AR: You talk about the need to adopt a non-gendered language and behaviour. It’s a complex spectrum. How does the ingressive-congressive theory sit on intersectional feminism?

Intersectional feminism is so important because women’s rights must be separated from the rights of other oppressed groups. In a way as my theory is not speaking about gender directly, it is inherently intersectional.

However, we still need to address every kind of prejudice head-on as well.

AR: On the same note, you talk about the need for newer words to break our prior association with gender. You explain how words such as ‘feminism’ or ‘mansplaining’ can mean different things to different people, and that in many cases, can be too restrictive. How does it expand to the entire lexicon of feminism? 

EC: I am not saying we should be ‘gender-blind’ any more than we should be race blind. While there is still direct prejudice on grounds of gender, race, or any other form of identity, we need to have a language to call it out and to fight it.

We should separate those issues from questions of character, and un-gender our terminology for things that are not directly tied to gender, such as character types.

AR: At what point did you make the switch from the ‘ingressive’ mode of teaching to the ‘congressive’ mode?

EC: It was a gradual switch. I wanted to be more congressive than most ways of teaching I had seen, although I didn’t have the terminology to say so. But the system was so ingressive, and I was so junior and inexperienced, there was a limit to how far I could take things.

I met a lot of resistance from the ingressive university environment. It was only when I moved to the School of the Art Institute of Chicago that I was able to make my teaching extremely congressive. It offered a congressive environment overall — it had small classes, no grades, and was female-dominated at every level.

AR: You make references to writers Angela Saini and Cordelia Fine on partiality in science. Can you elaborate?

EC: Angela Saini’s book Inferior and Cordelia Fine’s book Testosterone Rex give very comprehensive accounts of all the ways attempted science about gender difference is flawed. In many cases, it has assumptions about gender differences built into the null hypothesis, that is, the baseline assumption that scientists will default to in the absence of any evidence to the contrary.

In other cases the differences observed are just very, very tiny. The methodology is flawed because a huge leap was made between the measurable quality being studied (such as the length of time a baby stares at a picture) and the very un-measurable quality being inferred (such as one’s ability as a research mathematician).

In other cases, we simply can’t be sure that the measured difference is biologically innate, as there are many examples where biological gender differences in animals can be changed within one generation by changing the environment.

AR: Multiple studies have highlighted under-representation of women in COVID-19 research as well as gender inequality in the world’s general response to the pandemic. What would be your take on them?

EC: I think that the under-representation of women as subjects of science research is a long-standing and very serious problem. This has been very comprehensively written about by Caroline Criado Perez in Invisible Women.

I believe that non-white people have also been under-represented in research regarding the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19). It is a serious problem, given that they have been suffering at much higher rates than white people — at least in the United States. Of course, this is not necessarily a biological issue, but reflects the deep structural inequalities in society in terms of socio-economics.

The world leaders’ response to the pandemic is also a complex issue. Better responses to the pandemic seem to be to do with congressive styles of leadership, for example, listening to advice from scientific experts rather than posturing, and being risk-averse when it comes to human life.

This is an example where I think it really helps to have un-gendered terminology, so that we can focus on the styles of leadership rather than the specific genders of the leaders involved.

However, it is still worth considering gender, because arguably the very fact that a country is able to elect a woman as leader may say something about the level of equality in the country.

Moreover, I believe women have to be far more competent than men to reach the same levels of leadership in our unequal society. This is the difference between leadership effectiveness and leadership emergence.

This is a question of direct gender bias (against women), but also indirect gender bias, which is where my ingressive / congressive theory comes in. Society rewards ingressive behaviour for leadership, and this currently tends to favour men, although congressive behaviour may well be more effective in leadership, as has, perhaps, been shown by responses to the pandemic.

AR: Your book underlines the need to mount all arguments on logic, to evaluate circumstances on a different dimension instead of the regular male-female paradigm. Do you see that evolution happening around you, in STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) and otherwise?

EC: I do see it beginning to happen in progressive education situations. This seems to be especially the case in smaller liberal arts schools, which are already much more congressive than the ‘prestigious’ research-focused universities.

One way in which I see this is the invitations I receive to do campus visits including public talks and outreach events for nearby schools. I receive many invitations from smaller liberal arts schools and very few (or maybe none) from the sorts of ‘world-famous’ schools that still seem to focus more on Nobel prizes and huge research grants.

AR: You draw your most of your ideas from the category theory. What can be the limits to this postulation?

EC: We should think more clearly about which issues are directly gender-based, such as direct gender prejudice, and which things are indirect and more about character types. We need to make sure we address both: The issues related to intrinsic characteristics and those based more on behaviour. We need to address both, but without assuming they are one and the same.

If we only address direct gender prejudice we would be stuck in one-dimensional thinking. We would risk being accused of ‘reverse sexism’, and would end up addressing only diversity (numbers), but not inclusivity.

If we only address the indirect bias and not the direct sexism, we will not be able to correct for past injustices that women have experienced, just like if we do not address racism directly then we can’t be anti-racist. My new un-gendered terminology, I believe, gives us a framework for doing this. (downtoearth.org.in)

We discuss the digital divide, but the new-normal induced by COVID-19 should make us discuss the living divide as well

By Sunita Narain

The novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) lockdown has led to disruptions on a scale we have never seen before. It is not clear what the new-normal of our lives will be.

For most of us working in offices, remote work should have been a welcome respite; a chance to improve our work-life balance. But many of us are finding that even with increase in productivity, we are losing the ability to differentiate between work and rest of life — there is fatigue and burn-out — in this strange remote world.

Also, we are learning that productivity — doing things on time and on schedule — is not the only measure to value our work. In fact, it is collaboration and teamwork that brings us fulfillment and improves the quality of our “work”.

So, many of us are looking at a hybrid-model of work in this new-normal. One that builds on the best of this remote technology-world that allows us not to commute long distances every day, but also one that encourages and builds more, not less, interaction between people.

But this new-hybrid normal — and this should bother us — will sharpen inequality in workplaces, and it will lead to more joblessness in the formal sectors of the economy. The fact is that working from home assumes that there is adequate space — physical and recreational.

We discuss the digital divide, but this new-normal should make us discuss the living divide as well. It also means that our workplace will shed many non-essential costs — from support functions to rentals.

All this contraction and re-engineering will be good, and bad. More efficiency at the workplace; reduction in commercial building spaces that take up valuable green spaces; less traffic that reduces congestion and pollution; and, of course, reduced consumption that will be good for the planet and our livability index.

Bad, because it will mean that people will be out of jobs — the economy as we know it only knows how to produce as cheaply as possible and to consume as fast as possible. We are beings of the marketplace.

So, what can we do differently? There is, of course, the prospect — and a very real one — that nothing will change post-lockdown. Once the vaccine hits the market, we humans will go back to all our old habits.

In fact, governments will do everything to “stimulate” consumption as this then gets the economy ticking again. Let’s not forget how during the economic slowdown in the early 1990s, the then United States President George Bush walked down shopping malls urging fellow Americans to buy, and buy more.

Now China’s Xi Jinping has been making trips to his factories and shops, urging people to consume more and to buy domestic products. Xi wants to re-tool his country’s economy from exports to internal consumption.

It is the ultimate nightmare for western environmentalists, who could do so little to drive change in their own countries, that every Chinese or Indian would begin to consume like an American. But horror it will be as countries rush to open up and rev up the brown business again.

But I believe there are imperatives that will make us want to change — from the small individual-size triggers to the big societal and economic levers. If we do not want to go back to office from 9 am to 5 pm, five days a week, and want to adopt that new hybrid work model, then there will be costs to the formal economy as we know it today.

It will need to be repositioned so that new jobs are created. Those jobs will not come from the businesses we know today, but from the ones we will need in the future.

But I believe the most critical difference will be the fact that there will be less cash going around. Whatever governments may say, COVID-19 has shattered economies. Furthermore, there are multiple crises that will need public spending — from rebuilding after floods and other such disasters to the continuing health crisis and loss of livelihoods.

So, unless governments are completely out of touch with their realities — and this could happen as technology can today create false narratives at the scale and sophistication never seen in any past autocratic leaders’ propaganda machine — they will have to invest in the well-being of many as against the wealth of some.

This then means working deliberately on strategies that address the local needs and to invest in these communities. This is because there is just too much inefficiency in the transfer of resources — water, cash, food or work — from the faraway to the local.

It is much better to invest in ways that can sustain growth and build resilience for the next inevitable shock. This then is where our mindfulness will be needed.

So, as we open up in the still COVID-19 racked and ravaged world, let’s take time to think about what we treasured the most in this disruption. And what we want to keep, and what we want to change. This is how we will re-work the future. (downtoearth.org.in)

If the combined might of brands like Unilever and Coca-Cola don’t scare Mark Zuckerberg, who can hold the social media platform to account?

There is no power on this earth that is capable of holding Facebook to account. No legislature, no law enforcement agency, no regulator. Congress has failed. The EU has failed. When the Federal Trade Commission fined it a record $5bn for its role in the Cambridge Analytica scandal, its stock price actually went up.

Which is what makes this moment so interesting and, possibly, epochal. If the boycott of Facebook by some of the world’s biggest brands – Unilever, Coca-Cola, Starbucks – succeeds, it will be because it has targeted the only thing that Facebook understands: its bottom line. And if it fails, that will be another sort of landmark.

Because this is a company that facilitated an attack on a US election by a foreign power, that live-streamed a massacre then broadcast it to millions around the world, and helped incite a genocide.

I’ll say that again. It helped incite a genocide. A United Nations report says the use of Facebook played a “determining role” in inciting hate and violence against Myanmar’s Rohingya, which has seen tens of thousands die and hundreds of thousands flee for their lives.

 Facebook is not a mirror. It’s a gun. Unlicensed, out of control, in the hands of 2.6 billion people across the planet

I often think about that report. When I watch documentaries showing Facebook employees playing ping-pong inside their Menlo Park safe space. When I took a jaunt to the suburban Silicon Valley town earlier this year and strolled down the “normal” street where Mark Zuckerberg lives his totally normal life as the sole decision-maker in a company the like of which the world has never seen before. When I heard that Maria Ressa, the Filipino journalist who has done so much to warn of Facebook’s harms, had been sentenced to jail. When I read the Orwellian defence that our former deputy prime minister Nick Clegg wrote last week. “Platforms like Facebook hold a mirror up to society,” he said.

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Facebook is not a mirror. It’s a gun. Unlicensed – it is not subject to laws or control – it is in the hands and homes of 2.6 billion people, infiltrated by covert agents acting for nation states, a laboratory for groups who praise the cleansing effects of the Holocaust and believe 5G will fry our brainwaves in our sleep.

People sometimes say that if Facebook was a country, it would be bigger than China. But this is the wrong analogy. If Facebook was a country, it would be a rogue state. It would be North Korea. And it isn’t a gun. It’s a nuclear weapon.

Because this isn’t a company so much as an autocracy, a dictatorship, a global empire controlled by a single man. Who – even as the evidence of harm has become undeniable, indisputable, overwhelming – has simply chosen to ignore its critics across the world.

Instead, it has continued to pump out relentless, unbelievable, increasingly preposterous propaganda even as it controls the main news distribution channels. And just as the citizens of North Korea are unable to operate outside the state, it feels almost impossible to be alive today and live a life untouched by Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram.

The #StopHateForProfit campaign is focused on hate speech. It’s what has united six American civil rights organisations in the US to lobby advertisers to “pause” their ads for July, a campaign precipitated by Facebook’s decision not to remove a post by Donald Trump threatening violence against Black Lives Matter protesters: “When the looting starts, the shooting starts.”

But this is so much bigger than Facebook’s problem with hate. And it goes far far beyond the US, though the role it will play in the US election is pivotal (and it’s worth noting that #StopHateForProfit’s demands don’t extend to stopping lies in political ads, a crucial necessity). Facebook’s harms are global. Its threat to democracy is existential.

Is it a coincidence that the three countries that have dealt with coronavirus worst are those with populist leaders whose campaigns exploited Facebook’s ability to spread lies at scale? Trump, Bolsonaro, Johnson. Perhaps. Perhaps not.

And if you don’t care about democracy, think for a moment about coronavirus. If and when a vaccine comes along, will enough people want to have it? Facebook is riddled with anti-vaxxing like it’s infected by antisemitism. If that’s a mirror, Nick, you might want to take a long, cold, hard look in it.

Zuckerberg is not Kim Jong-un. He’s much, much more powerful. “My guess is that all these advertisers will be back on the platform soon enough,” he is reported to have told employees last week. And although 500 companies have now joined the boycott, the Wall Street Journal reports this represents only a 5% dip in profits. It may turn out that Facebook isn’t just bigger than China. It’s bigger than capitalism.

It comes, in the end, down to us and our wallets and what we say to these brands. Because the world has to realise that there’s no one and no thing coming to the rescue. Trump and Zuckerberg have formed an unspoken, almost certainly unstated, strategic alliance. Only the US has the power to clip Facebook’s wings. And only Facebook has the power to stop Trump spreading lies.

Sometimes you don’t realise the pivotal moments in history until it’s too late. And sometimes you do. It’s not quite yet too late. Just almost.

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If the forces of authoritarianism and sectarian bigotry continue to gather momentum, and the Supreme Court does little or nothing to check them, then the verdict of history and of constitutional scholarship will be even harsher than it is at present.

Honourable Judges,
This letter is written with respect as well as in anguish. I write as a historian and as a citizen, concerned in both capacities with the growing lack of faith among many Indians in the functioning of the Supreme Court (SC). Let me say straight away that this is part of a wider degradation of Indian democracy, in which the Court is by no means the central actor. Other (and possibly more serious) manifestations of this degradation are the politicisation of the civil service and the police; the creation of a cult of personality; the intimidation of the media; the use of tax and investigative agencies to harass and intimidate independent voices; the refusal to do away with repressive colonial-era laws and instead the desire to strengthen them; and not, least, the undermining of Indian federalism by the steady whittling down of the powers of the states by the Centre.

I should also make it clear that this ongoing degradation of Indian democracy is not the fault of one party or one leader alone. Rather, these perversions of the democratic process were set in motion by the Congress Party when it was in power at the Centre; and they have been further deepened under the rule of the Bharatiya Janata Party since May 2014.

While the SC cannot be blamed in any way for why and how this degradation of Indian democracy originated, it has, in recent years, done little to stop or stem it. Some examples of its failures in this regard have been the Court’s refusal to strike down laws like UAPA that should have no place in a constitutional democracy; its unconscionable delay in hearing major cases (such as with regard to election funding and the Citizenship Amendment Act); and its denial of basic human rights to the children and students of Kashmir, deprived for a full year of access to education and knowledge as a consequence of the longest internet shutdown in the history of any democracy. Constitutional scholars and practising lawyers can perhaps multiply these examples manifold.

Opinion | Judiciary should not unwittingly lend its shoulders for somebody else’s gun to rest and fire
The COVID-19 crisis has seen a further acceleration of this dangerous trend towards authoritarianism and the centralisation of power. The Union government and the ruling party have used the crisis to further promote the cult of personality, to further diminish the powers of state governments, and to further attack the free press. Regrettably, as the hearings and orders of the past few months show, the Supreme Court seems unable or unwilling to check these ominous trends.
The failure of the SC is in part a failure of leadership. That one serving chief justice could tell a daughter wishing to see her mother who had been detained under a draconian act to be careful about the cold, and that another serving chief justice could tell migrant workers left jobless after the unplanned lockdown that since they were being given some food they should not ask for wages — that such callous and unfeeling remarks could come from the chief justice himself reflect poorly on the Court. And that, in the less than six years that the current government has been in power, one chief justice has accepted a Governorship immediately on retirement, and another has accepted a Rajya Sabha seat, also immediately on retirement, reflect even more poorly.

Yet one cannot blame the top man alone. It may be that the powers of the so-called Master of the Roster are imperfectly defined, and can lead themselves to widespread misuse by the incumbent (as the press conference held by J Chelameswar et al in 2018 asserted). But, if the Court is complicit in the steady, continuing and accelerating degradation of our democratic processes and democratic institutions, this cannot be attributed entirely to the chief justices. I think the time has come for all the serving justices in the highest court of the land to think seriously about the ever-increasing gap between their calling as defined by the Constitution, and the direction the Court is now taking.

The reputation of the Supreme Court of India today may be at its lowest ebb since the Emergency. That is the clear impression one gets from the writings of our top constitutional scholars. Thus, in a commentary on the last chief justice, Gautam Bhatia writes that “under his tenure, the Supreme Court has gone from an institution that — for all its patchy history — was at least formally committed to the protection of individual rights as its primary task, to an institution that speaks the language of the executive, and has become indistinguishable from the executive” (The Wire, March 16, 2019). Meanwhile, Pratap Bhanu Mehta has observed: “We look to the Supreme Court for a semblance of constitutional deliverance. We have no idea how a court will rule. But one of the lessons of our recent history is that we misunderstand how a Supreme Court functions in a democracy. The Supreme Court has badly let us down in recent times, through a combination of avoidance, mendacity, and a lack of zeal on behalf of political liberty” (IE, December 12, 2019). Most recently, in writing of “the transformation of the Indian state into a repository of repression”, Suhas Palshikar comments that “this political transformation would not have been so easy without the willingness of the judiciary to look the other way, and occasionally join in the project” (IE, August 4).

These assessments are shared by many of the wisest and most experienced members of the Bar, who —unlike the scholars cited above — are not at liberty to express their anxieties in public. I broadly endorse the assessments of Bhatia, Mehta and Palshikar myself. At the same time, as a historian, I know that while institutions do decay, they can also be revived. In the case of the Supreme Court, its capitulation to the state and politicians in power in the 1970s, before and during the Emergency, was followed by a steady assertion of its independence and autonomy in the 1980s and 1990s. One must likewise hope that the current decline may be arrested and reversed in the years to come. If, on the other hand, the forces of authoritarianism and sectarian bigotry continue to gather momentum, and the Supreme Court does little or nothing to check them, then the verdict of history and of constitutional scholarship will be even harsher than it is at present. In that case, the Court of today may come to be viewed by future generations of Indians not merely as an executive Court, but as a collaborationist Court.
Hence this letter, a desperate cry from a historian and citizen who sees his country’s democracy and constitutional framework crumble before his eyes.

Sincerely yours,
Ramachandra Guha
This article first appeared in the print edition on August 12 under the title “Honourable judges”. The writer is a Bengaluru-based historian (indianexpress.com)

Tweets by Bhushan were statements of fact that in no way scandalised the court: Dave

When the Supreme Court has reinstated an employee who had accused the then Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi of sexually harassing her, how can it haul up activist Prashant Bhushan for contempt for voicing his bona fide opinion about the judiciary and an action of the incumbent Chief Justice, senior advocate Dushyant Dave asked on Wednesday.

The top court on July 22 initiated contempt proceedings against Bhushan for a tweet about Chief Justice S.A. Bobde posing on a Harley Davidson and another alleging that democracy had been destroyed in the country during the last six years under the last four Chief Justices.

Dave appeared for the activist before a bench headed by Justice Arun Mishra and including Justices B.R. Gavai and Krishna Murari.

“The Supreme Court has taken back the woman who raised sexual harassment charges against a former Chief Justice of India. What does that mean? It says there was truth in her allegations.… When allegations are made against the highest constitutional functionary, please, for God’s sake, do not suppress it,” Dave pleaded.

Had her allegations been untrue, these would amount to contempt, Dave said. But since the top court chose to reinstate her in January this year, it suggests that what she alleged was the truth, for which no contempt arises.

“Your Lordships may look at the case against Mr Bhushan in the same light. She (the alleged victim) was reinstated and all the charges against her were dropped. It only clearly shows that she was speaking the truth. Was any contempt issued against her? What kind of impression does it give to the world?” he asked.

Bhushan too cannot be hauled up for contempt for voicing his “bona fide impressions” of the judiciary and the action of the present Chief Justice, who had posed on the “Rs 50 lakh” Harley-Davidson during the Covid lockdown which has been cited to close the Supreme Court, Dave contended. People seeking enforcement of their fundamental rights do not have access to the court, Bhushan had noted.

“Tell us whether motorcycle has political colour; I am asking on the lighter side,” Justice Mishra said. The motorcycle Chief Justice Bobde posed on is registered in the name of a BJP leader’s son. However, sources close to the Chief Justice had said the bike had been brought to him by a Harley-Davidson executive and he did not know who the owner was.

The tweets by Bhushan were statements of fact that in no way scandalised the court, the lawyer contended.

“The two tweets are not against the institution. They are against the judges in their personal capacity regarding their conduct. They are not malicious and do not obstruct administration of justice,” Dave submitted.

Returning to the sexual harassment complaint against Gogoi, Dave said that despite the allegations, the former Chief Justice had been accorded a Rajya Sabha seat by the present government.

“A judge (Ranjan Gogoi) sits on a Saturday in his own case regarding sexual harassment and subsequently gets a seat in the Rajya Sabha with Z-plus category security, which he (Bhushan) said had raised serious question marks over his (Gogoi’s) decisions in the Rafale, Ayodhya and CBI director case,” Dave argued.

Gagoi

No one is infallible
“Nobody can claim to be infallible, including judges,” Dave said, pleading that Bhushan’s tweets were posted in the course of his expressing deep anguish at the way several cases, including those relating to the abrogation of Article 370 and the anti-CAA protests, were being dealt with by the top court.

There were serious misgivings among the bar and general public over the manner in which some “politically sensitive” cases are allocated, he contended.

“For instance, why do only certain judges get politically sensitive matters? Justice (R.F.) Nariman, for example, never gets assigned such matters,” Dave said.

Justice Mishra replied: “Justice Nariman had been part of many constitution bench matters in this court.”

Justice B.R. Gavai said Justice Nariman was also part of the bench that heard the row over the powers of the Manipur Speaker. Dave asked that if judges can criticise the institution, why can’t Bhushan?

He recalled the unprecedented news conference held on January 12, 2018, by four sitting judges of the Supreme Court who had said that the administration of the Supreme Court “was not in order and many things less than desirable were happening”.

“There is nothing wrong in one not withholding views when you feel that everything is not hunky-dory in the Supreme Court. Can I be held for contempt for expressing my views?” he asked.

The Supreme Court’s healing touch was required, the lawyer said.

“It will be no good for the institution. I beg you to ignore it,” Dave said, pleading that the court drop the contempt proceedings against Bhushan.

“The comments were not out of malice or vendetta. They were made out of love and affection for the judiciary. People like Mr Bhushan take up issues that many a times the executive is not willing to do.”

Bhushan fit for Padma Vibhushan

The Supreme Court had itself lauded Bhushan for espousing public interest litigations in earlier high-profile cases such as the 2G spectrum scandal and the coal scam.

“Your Lordships have appreciated Mr Bhushan’s work in matter of allocation of 2G licences, coal-block allocation, mining in forests etc.… Perhaps you would have given him a Padma Vibhushan for the work he did in the last 30 years,” Dave said.

The court reserved its judgment. (telegraphindia.com)

रेगिस्तानी टिड्डों के विशाल हुजूम पूर्वी अफ्रीका, एशिया और मध्य पूर्व में क़हर बरपा रहे हैं. टिड्डों के विशाल झुंड से फ़सलों को ख़तरा है, लोगों की रोज़ी रोटी को ख़तरा है और खाने पीने की आपूर्ति को नुक़सान पहुंचने का डर है. दुनिया के एक बड़े हिस्से पर टिड्डों का ये हमला पिछले कई दशकों में सबसे बड़ा बताया जा रहा है. लेकिन, जानकारों ने चेतावनी दी है कि अगर कुछ जगहों पर टिड्डों के क़हर को नहीं रोका गया, तो आने वाले बारिश के सीज़न के दौरान कई देशों में टिड्डों के झुंड की तादाद बीस गुना तक बढ़ सकती है. (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-8f45ee5d-04ab-4089-9e3a-a5f06b84fbe5)

टिड्डे हैं क्या और वो इतनी बड़ी तादाद में अचानक कहां से आ गए?

ऑग्युमेंटेड रियालिटी का अनुभव पाने के लिए आधुनिक तकनीक का इस्तेमाल होता है. और हम आपको इस बात की गारंटी नहीं दे सकते कि ये सभी ब्राउज़र पर अच्छे से काम करेगा.

इंटरएक्टिव एक अकेला रेगिस्तानी टिड्डा
एआर इस्तेमाल करने के निर्देश 

इस टिड्डी की ही तरह रेगिस्तानी टिड्डे सूखे इलाक़ों में रहते हैं. ये पश्चिम अफ़्रीका और भारत के बीच के क़रीब तीस देशों में पाए जाते हैं. ये पूरा क्षेत्र लगभग एक करोड़ साठ लाख वर्ग किलोमीटर या 62 लाख वर्ग मील का है

ये टिड्डों के ही रिश्तेदार हैं. शर्मीले होने के कारण ये आम तौर पर अकेले ही रहते हैं

और वो बिना किसी की नज़र में आए ऐसे ही अकेले बरसों बरस जीते हैं

लेकिन कभी कभार ये शर्मीली रेगिस्तानी टिड्डियां किसी अचानक से राक्षसी रूप धर लेती हैं.

और जब किसी हरे भरे इलाक़े में अचानक बारिश बंद हो जाती है और सूखा पड़ जाता है, तो ये मामूली टिड्डे अपना एकांतवास त्याग कर छोटे छोटे राक्षसों के भयानक झुंड में तब्दील हो जाते हैं

इंटरएक्टिव अकेले रहने वाले टिड्डों में परिवर्तन कैसे होता है?

जब ये रेगिस्तानी टिड्डियां इकट्ठा हो जाती हैं, तो इनके दिमाग़ से एक केमिकल निकलता है, जिसका नाम है सेरोटोनिन. ये केमिकल इनके शरीर में रिसता है, जिसके कारण इन मामूली टिड्डों के शरीर और बर्ताव में क्रांतिकारी बदलाव आ जाता है.

इन कीड़ों का न केवल रंग बदलकर चटख हो जाता है. बल्कि ये तेज़ तर्रार भी हो जाते हैं. इनकी भूख जाग जाती है और ये बड़े सामाजिक हो जाते हैं. यानी इनके बीच आपस में मेल-जोल बढ़ जाता है

जब ये टिड्डे अपना रंग रूप और मिज़ाज बदल लेते हैं और भुक्खड़ हो जाते हैं, तो ये अपने जैसे साथी टिड्डों को तलाशते हैं. इनकी जनसंख्या में विस्फोट हो जाता है. और ये धीरे धीरे ऐसे झुंड बना लेते हैं, जो देखते ही देखते सब कुछ तहस नहस कर डालने वाले टिड्डी दल में परिवर्तित हो जाते हैं

इंटरएक्टिव टिड्डों के ये दल उड़ कर फ़सलों को तबाह करने लगते हैं

जब एक बार ये टिड्डे झुंड बनाने लगते हैं, तो उनके दल बेहद विशाल हो सकते हैं. टिड्डों के एक दल में दस अरब तक टिड्डे हो सकते हैं. और ये टिड्डी दल सैकड़ों किलोमीटर में फैल सकता है

संयुक्त राष्ट्र के खाद्य एवं कृषि संगठन के अनुसार, टिड्डियों के एक औसत आकार का दल भी इतनी फ़सलें तबाह करने की क्षमता रखता है, जिनसे ढाई हज़ार लोगों को पूरे साल भर खाना खिलाया जा सकता है.

टिड्डियों के ऐसे ही तबाही मचाने वाले दल पूर्वी अफ्रीका, यमन, ईरान, पाकिस्तान और भारत में बन रहे हैं. और विश्व खाद्य एवं कृषि संगठन ने इन टिड्डियों वाले इलाक़ों को हाई अलर्ट पर रहने की चेतावनी जारी की है

खाद्य एवं कृषि संगठन (FAO) का कहना है कि टिड्डियों के इन ख़तरनाक झुंडों ने पहले ही कीनिया, इथियोपिया और सोमालिया जैसे कई देशों में ऐसी तबाही मचाई है, जैसी इन देशों ने कई दशकों में नहीं देखी. और अभी भी इनसे अभूतपूर्व ख़तरा बना हुआ है. इस बात का डर भी है कि राक्षसी टिड्डियों का ये दल पश्चिम अफ़्रीका पर भी धावा बोल सकता है

लेकिन, तेज़ी से बढ़ते टिड्डियों के ये दल अब मध्य पूर्व और पाकिस्तान में हरियाली पर हमला बोल रहे हैं. और टिड्डियों के इन झुंडों से भारत में भी फ़सलों पर ख़तरा मंडरा रहा है

पूर्वी अफ़्रीका, मध्य पूर्व, भारत और पाकिस्तान में सक्रिय टिड्डियों के दल को दिखाने वाला नक़्शा
खाद्य एवं कृषि संगठन (FAO) का कहना है कि अगर इन राक्षसी कीड़ों से बचने के लिए अतिरिक्त उपाय नहीं किए जाते हैं, तो बारिश के मौसम में टिड्डियों के इन ख़तरनाक झुंडों के आकार में बीस गुना तक इज़ाफ़ा हो सकता है

चिंता वाली बात ये है कि टिड्डियों के दल के हमले झेल रहे ये देश, पहले से ही कई संकटों, जैसे कि बाढ़, संघर्ष और कोरोना वायरस के प्रकोप से जूझ रहे हैं

उत्तरी कीनिया के चरवाहे और टिड्डियों के झुंड का पता लगाने वाले अलबर्ट लेमासुलानी कहते हैं कि, 'कोविड-19 के बाद अब टिड्डी दलों के हमले से हमारे ऊपर मानो दो दो महामारियों की मार पड़ रही है. टिड्डियों के ये झुंड जहां भी ज़मीन पर उतरते हैं, वो लगभग सब कुछ चट कर जाते हैं. उनका हमला बेहद डरावने ख़्वाब जैसा है.'

टिड्डों के दलों के इस हमले का कारण 2018-19 के दौर में आए समुद्री तूफ़ान और बारिश हैं

दो साल पहले दक्षिणी अरब प्रायद्वीप में तेज़ बारिश से पैदा हुई नमी और उचित माहौल के कारण टिड्डियों की तीन पीढ़ियां मज़े में पली बढ़ीं. संयुक्त राष्ट्र का कहना है कि टिड्डियों की आबादी में आए इस ज़बरदस्त उछाल पर किसी की नज़र ही नहीं पड़ी

अल्बर्ट लेमासुलानी, उत्तरी कीनिया के चरवाहे और टिड्डी दलों पर निगाह रखने वाले
उत्तरी कीनिया में जानवर पालने वाले अल्बर्ट लेमासुलानी टिड्डियों के दल का पता लगाने में मदद करते हैं
कई देशों में टिड्डों पर क़ाबू पाने के अभियान चलाए जाने के बावजूद, हाल में हुई भारी बारिश ने टिड्डियों की आबादी बढ़ाने के लिए बिल्कुल सही माहौल तैयार कर दिया है

इस समय टिड्डियों की अगली पीढ़ी के अंडे फूट रहे हैं. और ठीक इसी समय पूरे क्षेत्र में किसान फ़सलों के नए सीज़न की बुवाई कर रहे हैं. कृषि एवं खाद्य संगठन का कहना है कि टिड्डियों के हमले से पहले ही खाद्य संकट से जूझ रहे कई देशों की चुनौतियां और बढ़ जाएंगी. ख़ास तौर से पूर्वी अफ्रीका के देशों में.

इस समय खाद्य एवं कृषि संगठन टिड्डियों के दलों को क़ाबू करने के लिए फंड जुटा रहा है. लेकिन, कई देशों के लिए कीटनाशकों का छिड़काव बहुत देर से उठाया गया क़दम साबित हुआ है

उत्तरी कीनिया और उसके आगे के किसानों ने तो टिड्डी दलों के हमले में अपना सब कुछ पहले ही गंवा दिया है

अल्बर्ट लेमासुलानी कहते हैं कि, 'हर रोज़ पांच, छह, सात या दस टिड्डी दल हमला करते हैं.' लेमासुलानी टिड्डी दल से निपटने के संयुक्त राष्ट्र और कीनिया सरकार के अभियान में मदद देने के लिए स्वयंसेवकों की एक टीम की अगुवाई करते हैं. अल्बर्ट कहते हैं कि, 'अगर ऐसा ही चलता रहा तो हम पूरी तरह बर्बाद हो जाएंगे. हमारी ज़िंदगी ख़त्म हो जाएगी.'

क्रेडिट
टिड्डों के मॉडल और एनिमेशन-जैस्मिन बोनशोर, डिज़ाइन-गेरी फ्लेचर, स्टोरी डेवेलपमेंट-कैट्रिओना मॉरिसन, स्टीवेन कॉनर और एडम एलेन. लेखन-लूसी रोजर्स. फील्ड रिपोर्टिंग-जो वुड . (bbc.com/hindi)

कहते हैं, प्रेम किसी भी वायरस से बड़ा होता है. वो महामारी को मात दे देगा. और ज़िंदा रहेगा. यही है मोहब्बत का मुस्तकबिल.

दूसरी बातों के भविष्य के विपरीत प्रेम का भविष्य मेटाफिज़िक्स के घेरे में रहेगा - सूक्ष्म और गूढ़.

"हम केवल भावनात्मक, आध्यात्मिक और आभासी स्तर पर प्रेम कर सकते हैं. अब प्रेम और सेक्स दो अलग बातें हैं."

दिल्ली में रहने वाले प्रोफेशनल पप्स रॉय ख़ुद को लाइलाज विद्रोही बताते हैं. वे समलैंगिक हैं और कोरोना के बाद प्रेम के भविष्य पर बड़ी गहराई से बाते करते हैं.

अभी फिलहाल पप्स रॉय अपने फ़ोन के साथ एक फ़्लैट में फंसे हुए हैं. वो कहते हैं, "प्यार है कहीं बाहर. बस हमें प्यार करने के पुराने तरीके भुला कर नए तरीके सीखने होंगे."
लॉकडाउन से कुछ ही दिन पहले वो रेल में बैठकर एक आदमी के साथ किसी पहाड़ी शहर को निकल गए थे.

उन्हें लगा कि उन्हें उस आदमी से प्यार है और उसके साथ दो दिन बिताना चाहते थे. लेकिन तब तक लॉकडाउन हो गया और एक महीने तक वे वहीं फंस गए.

जब अप्रैल में वापस दिल्ली लौटे तब तक उनका भ्रम टूट चुका था. एक दूसरे के साथ होना एक दूसरे के साथ फंस जाने जैसा हो गया था.

सोशल डिस्टेंसिंग अब एक दूसरे से दूरी में तबदील हो गई थी. अब वो दिल्ली वापस लौट आए हैं. साथ में फ़ोन है और कई प्रेमी भी. वो ज्यादातर एक दूसरे के साथ चैट करते हैं.
कभी-कभी वीडियो के ज़रिए ही थोड़ा बहुत प्यार भी करते हैं. प्रेम का भविष्य कल्पना का मोहताज नहीं है. लोग परिस्थितियों के अनुसार अपने आप को ढाल लेते हैं.

इसी तरह हम भविष्य में क़दम रखते हैं. ई-हारमनी, ओके क्यूपिड और मैच जैसे डेटिंग प्लैटफ़ॉर्म पर लॉकडाउन के दौरान वीडियो डेटिंग में काफ़ी वृद्धि हुई है.

कई दूसरी बातों के भविष्य पर बहस हो रही है. धर्म, पर्यटन, शिक्षा, वगैरह.

लेकिन प्रेम का भविष्य? इसकी बात कुछ और है. ब्रिटेन में लॉकडाउन की शुरुआत में ही सरकार ने लोगों को सलाह दी कि वो अपने लवर के साथ ही रहें.

एक दूसरे के घर आने-जाने से वायरस का संक्रमण फैलने का ख़तरा बढ़ सकता है. यूरोप में ऐसे कई प्रस्ताव आए.

मई में नीदरलैंड की सरकार ने अकेले रहने वाले लोगों से कहा कि वो अपने लिए सेक्स पार्टनर खोज लें.

साथ ही यह सलाह भी दी कि दोनों मिल कर ये भी तय कर लें कि वो और कितने लोगों से मिलेंगे. क्योंकि वो जितने ज्यादा लोगों से मिलेंगे कोरोना संक्रमण का ख़तरा भी उतना ज्यादा बढ़ेगा.

एक सलाह यह भी थी कि 'दूसरों के साथ दूरी बना कर सेक्स करें.' कुछ सुझाव यह भी थे के औरों के साथ मिल कर हस्तमैथुन करें या फिर कामुक कहानियां पढ़ें.
वीडियो चैट्स अब आम हो चुके हैं. और फ़ोन सेक्स भी. रेस्तरां बंद होने की वजह से वास्तविक डेटिंग संभव नहीं है.

लिहाज़ा डेटिंग, शादियां और यहां तक की सेक्स भी वर्चुअल दुनिया में होने लगा है. ये मानो किसी भयानक भविष्य की तस्वीर हो.

लेकिन आने वाले कल की हर तस्वीर नए आयाम लेती रहती है, नई शक्ल में बनती ढलती है.
तारीख 20 अप्रैल थी.

बेंगलुरु की एक सुहानी शाम. 33 साल का एक आदमी अपनी बालकनी में टेबल पर वाइन की एक ग्लास के साथ मोमबत्ती जला कर बैठा था. ये वीडियो डेट थी. डेटिंग ऐप बंबल पर.

वो पहले भी डेटिंग ऐप का इस्तेमाल करते रहे हैं लेकिन कभी ज़्यादा समय नहीं बिताया था वहां. दरअसल, अपनी स्टार्टअप कंपनी के काम में इतना व्यस्त रहे कि समय नही मिल पाया.
लेकिन लॉकडाउन शुरू होने के बाद वो एक साथी की तलाश में इस ऐप का ज्यादा इस्तेमाल करने लगे. और साथी उन्हें मिल भी गई.

शुरुआत में बस एक दूसरे को पिंग करते या चैट करते रहे. धीरे-धीरे बातों का सिलसिला लंबा होता गया. और उसके बाद ये डेट तय हुई.

वो भी अपनी बालकनी में बैठी थी और ये अपनी बालकनी में. ये मुलाक़ात चालीस मिनट तक चली. और लॉकडाउन में ढील मिलने के बाद अंतत: वो वास्तव मे मिले. लड़के के घर की छत पर. वो मास्क पहन कर आई थी. जैसे लोग गले मिलते हैं वैसे तो नही, कुछ फासले से मिले. बस उनकी कहानियां एक दूसरे से छू गईं. लड़के ने कहा, "फ़िलहाल इतना ही सही."

वे कहते हैं, "हर किसी को किसी की तलाश है. अब लोग खुल कर बात करने लगे हैं. हम कोशिश करते हैं कि वायरस के बारे में बात ना करें. लेकिन इस दौरान जो दिमागी हालत है उस पर बात होती ही है. लोग किस हाल से गुज़र रहे हैं उस पर भी बात हुई. मैं इस माहौल में प्रेम करने के ख़तरे को अच्छी तरह समझता हूं. मैं ग़लतियां नहीं करना चाहता."

आशीष सहगल दिल्ली में रहते हैं. वो एक 'लाइफ़ कोच' हैं. इनका काम लोगों को उनकी समस्याओें को समझने और उनसे निपटने में मदद करना है.

वो कहते हैं कि हाल के दिनों में उन्हें ऐसे कपल्स के बहुत फ़ोन आते हैं जो वैवाहिक जीवन में समस्याओं से जूझ रहे हैं. महामारी के डर के कारण प्रेम संबंधो में कई बदलाव आएँगे."

"प्रेम एक अवधारणा के रूप में और भी मज़बूत होगा. डर के माहौल में प्रेम और भी फलता फूलता है."

प्रेम के संबंध में उनके और भी कई अनुमान हैं. "ज्यादा शादियां होंगी. तलाक भी बढ़ेंगे. और बच्चे भी ज़्यादा पैदा होंगे. ये सब विरोधाभासी बातें ज़रूर हैं, लेकिन हो सकता है शायद प्रेम का भविष्य ऐसा ही बेतरतीब और अराजक हो."
आशीष सहगल कहते हैं, "बहुत सारे लोग अकेलापन महसूस कर रहे हैं."

बहरहाल जहां तक प्रेम के भविष्य की बात है वो किसी भी सरकारी दिशा निर्देश या वायरस विशेषज्ञों के नीति निर्देश के दायरे से बाहर है. यह भविष्य फ़िलहाल एक मंथन के हवाले है.

आशीष सहगल की दलील है, "एचआईवी/एड्स लोगों को प्यार करने से नहीं रोक पाया. आज लोगों को प्यार की ज़रूरत और तलाश पहले से भी अधिक है."

"संक्रमण के दौर में अंतरंगता दिमाग में रहती है. हमारे देश में नैतिकता के ठेकेदार सैनिक इतने ज्यादा तत्पर हैं कि सेक्स पार्टनर जैसी अवधारणा का ज़िक्र करना तक मुश्किल है."

एचआईवी/एड्स से बचने के लिए कॉन्डम का इस्तेमाल होने लगा लेकिन उसकी तुलना महामारी से बचने के लिए मास्क के इस्तेमाल से नहीं हो सकती.

मुंबई के कामाठीपुरा में रहने वाली एक यौनकर्मी ने फ़ोन पर बातचीत के दौरान कहा कि उसने सुना है कि कई यौनकर्मी अब वीडियो कॉल के ज़रिए अपने ग्राहकों को अपनी सेवाएं दे रहीं हैं. लेकिन उसे यह अजीब लगता है. एचआईवी/एड्स की बात अलग थी. उससे बचने के लिए कॉन्डम काफ़ी था. लेकिन कोरोना वायरस तो छूने मात्र से संक्रमित कर सकता है.

स्क्रीन वाला प्यार और स्पर्श
और फ़ोन या कंप्यूटर की स्क्रीन स्पर्श का विकल्प तो नहीं हो सकती.

नेहा (बदला हुआ नाम) कहती हैं, "वो अपने ग्राहकों को जानने समझने में या उनके साथ किसी अर्थपूर्ण संवाद में कोई रुचि नहीं रखतीं. सेक्स उनके लिए बस काम है. इसलिए यह तरीका काम करता है."

नंदिता राजे, 28 साल की हैं. मेबेल इंडिया नाम के कपड़ों के ब्रैंड की मालकिन हैं. वो सिंगल हैं. वो कहती हैं अब उन्हें लोगो से मिलने में ख़ास दिलचस्पी नहीं है.

वो कहती हैं, "प्रेम का भविष्य काफ़ी अंधकारमय है. और मेरे लिए शायद अब इसका कोई मायने नहीं बचा है."

अब चूंकि किसी जगह किसी से मिलना मुश्किल है तो ऐसे में कई लोगों के लिए ऑनलाइन डेटिंग एक नया रास्ता बनता दिख रहा है. लेकिन बदलाव इसमें भी आ रहे हैं.
ज़ैक शलेइएन ने फ़रवरी 2019 में 'फ़िल्टर ऑफ़' नाम का प्लेटफ़ार्म शुरू किया था.

उन्होंने फ़रवरी 2020 में इसे रिलॉन्च किया. उनका मानना है कि वर्चुअल स्पीड डेटिंग ही भविष्य मे लोकप्रिय होगा.

'फ़िल्टर ऑफ़' एक ऐसा ऐप है जहां आप पहले 90 सेकंड के एक वीडियो के ज़रिए उस व्यक्ति का जायज़ा लेना चाहते हैं कि आप उसे देख सुन कर कैसा महसूस करते हैं. अगर आप को वो व्यक्ति पसंद आता है तो आप की जोड़ी बन जाती है और उसके बाद आप ऐप के ज़रिए एक दूसरे को मैसेज और वीडियो भेज सकते हैं.

वो आगे कहते हैं, "लॉकडाउन ख़त्म होने के बाद लोग ऑफ़लाइन मुलाकात करना शुरू कर देंगे."

नोएडा मे रहने वाले एक समलैंगिक व्यक्ति जो अपना नाम ज़ाहिर नहीं करना चाहते, उन्होंने कहा, "और इस तरह हमने चेहरे पर मास्क लगा कर भविष्य की दहलीज़ पर कदम रखा. यह डरावना मंज़र है. हमें पहले ही एचआईवी/एड्स से डर था और अब ये महामारी भी आ गई."

कपल्स के लिए मुश्किल दौर
अगर इस महामारी को रोकने के लिए कोई टीका विकसित हो भी जाए, तब भी लोग बेफ़िक्र हो कर एक दूसरे के गले मिलें, इस में काफ़ी समय लगेगा. चाहे जो हो, एक बात निश्चित है कि प्यार, सेक्स और रोमांस का भविष्य हमेशा के लिए बदल गया है.

कपल्स के लिए भी ये समय बहुत मुश्किल रहा है. लोग ऑफ़िस कम जा रहे हैं या ज्यादातर घर में रह कर काम कर रहे हैं.

बहुत से लोगों को एक दूसरे की इस क़दर मौजूदगी की आदत नहीं रही है. रिपोर्टों के अनुसार तलाक़ के मामले बढ़े हैं. घरेलू हिंसा की घटनाएं भी बढ़ी हैं. लेकिन लोग किसी तरह निबाह रहे हैं.

अंतरंग संबंधों मे हुई बढ़ोतरी के चलते कॉन्डम और गर्भ निरोधक दवाइयों की बिक्री में भी वृद्धि हुई है.

लॉकडाउन में बंबल डेटिंग ऐप के नए सबस्क्राइबर खूब बढ़े हैं.

बंबल की टीम का कहना है, "भारत में वीडियो और फोन कॉल की औसत अवधि कम से कम 18 मिनट तक रही है. यह एक संकेत है कि हमारे ऐप का इस्तेमाल करने वाले लोग सोशल डिस्टेंसिंग के इस दौर में एक दूसरे को समझने और गहरे और अर्थपूर्ण संबंध बनाने की कोशिश कर रहे हैं."

हाल ही में बंबल ने एक नया अभियान शुरू किया जिसे नाम दिया 'स्टे फ़ार एंड गेट क्लोज़' यानी दूर रह कर नज़दीकी संबंध बनाएं. इसका मक़सद लोगों को घर पर रह कर ही संबंध बनाने की शुरुआत करने के लिए प्रोत्साहित करना है.

टिंडर समेत कई डेटिंग ऐप्स के इस्तेमाल में पिछले हफ्तों मे काफ़ी तेजी आई है.

सिर्फ़ कॉफ़ी ऐप का कहना है कि वो दुनिया भर में बसे भारतीयों को प्यार तलाश करने में मदद करता है. सिर्फ़ कॉफ़ी ऐप में ऐसे साथी ढूंढने में मदद मिलती हैं जिनकी सोच या मिजाज़ एक दूसरे से मेल खाता हो.

इस ऐप प्लेटफ़ॉर्म की कार्यकारी उपाध्यक्ष नैना हीरानंदानी कहती हैं, "दूसरों से जुड़ना इंसान की अहम ज़रूरत है. इस महामारी के दौरान जो हालात बने हैं उस पर किसी का नियंत्रण नहीं है. लेकिन इस दौरान यह ज़रूरत और भी उभर कर आई है."

मार्च 2020 से इस ऐप के इस्तेमाल में 25 प्रतिशत बढ़त हुई है.

नैना हीरानंदानी कहती हैं, "लेकिन भारत में अभी भी लोग साथी खोजने के लिए वर्चुअल कॉल का रास्ता चुनने को लेकर कुछ सशंकित रहते हैं. मगर धीरे-धीरे हमारे 80 प्रतिशत सदस्यों को इस बात की आदत होने लगी है. इस महामारी के बाद हमारे काम करने, जीने और प्रेम करने या उसे खोजने के तरीके बदल जाएंगे."

लॉकडाउन शुरू होने के बाद से अब तक सिर्फ़ कॉफी ऐप की मुंबई, दुबई और लंदन स्थित टीम ने दुनिया भर मे 500 से ज्यादा मुलाक़ातें तय की हैं.

लेकिन कई लोग अभी इस वर्चुअल प्रेम के लिए तैयार नहीं हैं. करण अमीन 39 साल के हैं और मुंबई में विज्ञापन एजेंसी में काम करते हैं.

वो कहते हैं कि उन्होंने डेटिंग एप्स पर कई लोगों की प्रोफ़ाइल चेक की. इनमें से बहुत से लोगों का कहना था कि वो बोरियत की वजह से डेटिंग ऐप का इस्तेमाल कर रहे हैं.

करण अमीन आगे कहते हैं, "टिंडर एक ऐसा ऐप था जहां आप लोगों से संबंध बनाने के लिए संपर्क करते थे. लेकिन अब आप बाहर ही नहीं जा सकते थे."

एक लड़की जिसके साथ वो काफ़ी समय से चैट कर रहे थे उससे उन्होंने पूछा कि लॉकडाउन खुलने के बाद उसका क्या 'इरादा' है?"

उस लड़की ने जबाव दिया कि छह महीने तक तो वह किसी को छुएगी ही नहीं.

करण अमीन का सवाल है, "अब हम क्या करें? ऐसा सर्टिफ़िकेट लेकर चलें जो कहे हमें कोविड नहीं हुआ है. अगर वास्तव में मुलाक़ात ही नहीं हो सकती है तो डेटिंग ऐप पर मैचिंग करने का कोई फ़ायदा नही है."

ग्रांइडर एक ऐसा ऐप है जिसका इस्तेमाल समलैंगिक पुरुष करते हैं. इस ऐप मे एक फ़ीचर यह भी है कि वो बता सकता है कि कोई समलैंगिक साथी कितने फ़ासले पर है. कल तक ये फासला एक मीटर से कम भी होता था और ऐप तब भी आपको सूचित कर सकता है. लेकिन अब यह फ़ासले चंद मीटर से बढ़ कर मीलों के हो गए हैं.

क्वारंटीन पीढ़ी
कुछ विशेषज्ञों का ये भी अनुमान है कि दिसंबर 2020 तक अधिक संख्या में बच्चों का जन्म देखने को मिल सकता है. और हो सकता है ये नई पीढ़ी 2033 में 'क्वारंटीन' कहलाए.

न्यूयॉर्क में ज़ूम ऐप पर हुई शादियों को क़ानूनी वैधता मिल चुकी है. भारत में भी कुछ शादियों और शादी की सालगिरह ज़ूम ऐप पर मनाई गईं और वास्तविक शादियों के दौरान भी कम से कम मेहमान होना और सोशल डिस्टेंसिंग का पालन सामान्य बात हो रही है. असल मे नया भविष्य दरवाज़े पर आ खड़ा हुआ है और हम इसे अपना भी चुके हैं. हालांकि कुछ लोग 'सामान्य समय' के लौटने का इंतज़ार कर रहे हैं, बाकी लोग 'वर्चुअल या आभासी प्रेम' करने में मशगूल हो रहे हैं.

महामारी के संक्रमण काल में बहुत से लोगों के लिए प्रेम करने के ग़ैर पारंपरिक तरीके विकल्प बन रहे हैं. बशर्ते कि उनका दिल प्यार के लिए खुला हो. (www.bbc.com)

Former West Indies bowler Michael Holding gave a powerful, hard-hitting message on Black Lives Matter as cricket resumed after a long gap of more than three months.

Former West Indies bowler Michael Holding gave a powerful, hard-hitting message on Black Lives Matter as cricket resumed after a long gap of more than three months. (Live Score)

In the video that was broadcast by Sky Sports while cricket fans around the world waited for the match to begin after the delayed toss due to rain, Holding and former English women’s cricketer Ebony Rainford-Brent reflected on the much prevalent racism in the society.

“Everybody has heard about this lady in a park in America who was asked by a black man to put her dog on a leash, which is the law,” said the former West Indies paceman. “She threatened this black man with her whiteness, saying that she was going to call the police and tell them there was a black man threatening her.
“If the society in which she was living did not empower her or get her to think that she had that power of being white and being able to call the police on a black man, she would not have done it. It was an automatic reaction because of the society in which she lives. If you don’t educate people they will keep growing up in that sort of society and you will not get meaningful change.”
Holding believes that the large number of white people to have taken part in protests to support the Black Lives Matter movement can help bring about change – and has urged people to fully understand what the movement stands for. “At protests years ago, even when Martin Luther King was marching, you would have predominantly black faces and a few white faces. This time a lot of white people are involved in these protests and that is the difference,” said Holding.
“What they saw [happen to George Floyd] was disgusting and people thought to themselves ‘enough is enough’. Everyone is recognising it, coming alive and seeing the difference in treatment of people. We are all human beings so I hope that people recognise that the Black Lives Matter movement is not trying to get black people above white people or above anyone else. It is all about equality.

“When people say ‘all lives matter’ or ‘white lives matter’, please, we black people know white lives matter. I don’t think you know that black lives matter. Don’t shout back at us that all lives matter. White lives matter, it is obvious, the evidence is clearly there. We want black lives to matter now. Simple as that.”
Rainford-Brent, director of women’s cricket at Surrey said, “I think we have to be honest and we are starting to have those conversations now. Unless people in power connect with and understand and feel what it is like to be on the side of limited power, to not get access to opportunities, to know you are significantly less likely to be hired and significantly more likely to be stopped and searched, to be oppressed, we won’t progress.

“It can’t be a ‘black person’s problem’, it has got to be everyone’s problem. We have got to want a society that is representative and supports people from different backgrounds. That’s what it is for me. We need honest conversations, opportunities and people in positions of power. And then we can change the landscape.”
Reflecting on George Floyd’s death that started the Black Lives movement, she said, “I can still remember the moment I heard about George Floyd. I was lying in bed, turned my phone on and it was the first thing that came up on my [Instagram] story, a short version of the video.

“I clicked on it and clicked off as the first words you heard were ‘I can’t breathe’. I watched the whole thing, over eight minutes, and burst into tears,” she said. “The pain I felt – it was like a valve popped because we know for how long these inequalities, these injustices have taken place, not just in the US, it happens here. I felt like I was torn apart. I never swear on my Instagram but I wrote the words ‘is anyone else f*****g fed up watching black people get murdered?’
“You can’t not see it and it was frustrating that people are not seeing what is going on. I felt broken, it was two weeks of anger, of pain, of speaking to lots of different people who were fed up and frustrated with the state of our world and being gaslighted and told those issues don’t exist. They do exist,” she said.
“I knew I had to get involved, I went to three protests. It is a virus that has been part of our society for well over 400 years and is continuing to push this oppression. I think it is one of the most empowering experiences to be around a diverse community, everybody supporting and knowing that we need to uncover this, this needs to be dealt with.

“We cannot have it being acceptable that people are being killed day in, day out by the people who are meant to be protecting you,” she added. (indianexpress.com)

As part of an initiative under the Indian government’s new “Atmanirbhar Bharat”—or self-reliant India—mission, the coal ministry launched the auction of 41 coal blocks for commercial mining on 18 June. Three days earlier, sarpanchs of nine villages in Hasdeo Arand, a contiguous stretch of dense forest land in northern Chhattisgarh, wrote to Narendra Modi opposing the auction and calling upon the prime minister to prevent commercial mining in Hasdeo Arand. The sarpanchs wrote that the villagers had already established self-reliant lives and livelihoods, which would come under attack due to the auction. The letter added, “It is unfortunate that when the communities are already grappling with the COVID-19 crisis, they are faced with this uncertainty and threat of displacement.”

The villagers protesting the proposed coal project challenged its legality. They argued that it contravened their individual and community forest rights, under the Panchayats (Extension of Scheduled Areas) Act of 1996, the Forest Rights Act of 2006 and the Land Acquisition Act of 2013. These laws require the informed consent from gram sabhas before any land acquisition can take place in scheduled areas with a preponderance of Adivasi populations, such as the Hasdeo forest. Meanwhile, RRVUNL has claimed that these laws are not applicable to the Parsa project, and that in any case, the concerned gram sabhas had expressed their support for it. But the protesters argued that the gram sabhas of the affected villages had passed several unanimous resolutions since 2015 opposing the project, and that the ministry of environment, forests and climate change had awarded clearances on the basis of forged documents.

That day, RRVUNL published a “general caveat” in a local newspaper announcing that it “apprehends that a writ petition … or a Public Interest Litigation may be filed in the Hon’ble High Court as the Land acquisition proceeding is being initiated” in these villages. The public notice stated that RRVUNL had appointed Shailendra Shukla, a lawyer practising in the Chhattisgarh High Court, “to appear and oppose” any challenge to the land-acquisition proceedings on behalf of the power corporation.

The Parsa block is among 30 mapped block in Hasdeo Arand and one of three in the forest awarded to RRVUNL—the power corporation is already conducting mining operations at the adjacent block, Parsa East and Kete Basan. The project is spread over 1,252 hectares of land, and requires the diversion of 841 hectares located in Surguja and Surajpur districts, in the Hasdeo forest. The majority of the people in the region are members of Scheduled Tribe communities and over ninety percent of them are dependent on agriculture and forest produce for their livelihood. The Hasdeo Arand forests form the catchment area of the Hasdeo river, which irrigates over three lack hectares of agricultural land.

Baghel also accused the Modi government of providing the Adani Group a backdoor entry into coal mining through dubious contracts. But in March 2019, three months after Baghel took charge, the Adani Group was appointed as the mine developer and operator for Chhattisgarh’s Gidmuri and Paturia coal blocks. Baghel’s government has not intervened in the coal-mining projects in Hasdeo Arand. “We would like ask this government if they want to displace us Adivasis from our land,” Topo said.

In 2014, the National Green Tribunal set aside the clearance and sent the project back to the MoEFC for seeking fresh approval from the FAC. But the Supreme Court stayed the decision shortly after, and mining operations have continued unabated at the site ever since, even while the case remains pending before the apex court. In effect, mining operations at PEKB has become a fait accompli.

But in March 2017, the Parsa coal project was accorded terms of reference, which refers to conditions laid down by the MoEFC that a project proponent—RRVUNL in this case—would have to fulfil to develop and operate the mine. In March that year, residents of Hariharpur and Salhi passed resolutions rejecting the Parsa coal-block mining project. The decisions were reiterated in subsequent meetings at the village held in July and February 2018. The residents had also repeatably pointed this out in letters sent to the MoEFC, the coal ministry, the tribal affairs ministry, and state and district administrations since 2015.

Though the coal blocks are allocated to RRVUNL, the power company follows a model in which it appoints a private company as the “mine developer cum operator.” As I reported earlier for The Caravan, the concept of an MDO is not recognised in any law governing the Indian coal industry. At Parsa, before and after the reallocation of coal blocks in 2015, the mining operations are carried out by Adani Enterprises Limited. 

After the reallocation of the coal block to RRVUNL, the hearing was scheduled again in 2017. According to protesters, Adani continued the practice of eliciting consent through manipulation of public hearings for environmental clearance. The protesters said that the public hearing was conducted in way that silenced the strong opposition to the coal project. “There were people from outside villages like Salka and Udaipur,  who were brought to the hearing to support the project,” Jainandan Porte, the sarpanch of Ghatbarra, told me. “Many from severely affected areas couldn’t reach there. Also, we were made to wait for three–four hours, and by the time the hearing started, people were leaving and our strength had come down.” Residents of Salhi, Fatehpur, Ghatbarra and Hariharpur also told me that the public hearing was held in Besan, which is between five to ten kilometres away from these villages, in contravention of EAC guidelines to arrange it at a place convenient to the residents.

According to Alok Shukla, a convenor with HABSS, this time, too, RRVUNL and Adani tried to influence the hearing process by offering money and other benefits to the locals. “The hearing was managed to get consent by ensuring participation of residents outside the villages directly affected by land acquisition and those who supported the project,” Shukla told me. “The mining companies have for years been adopting methods like offering money, liquor and tour packages and offering false promises to win the support of some people who are then brought to the hearing venue in buses.”

RRVUNL submitted a response on 30 May 2018. The company first argued that the PESA act was not applicable in Chhattisgarh because the state government had not passed any legislation to incorporate the provisions into the Chhattisgarh Panchayat Raj Adhiniyam of 2003, which is the law governing panchayats in the state. RRVUNL further argued that the land acquisition would be governed by a different law altogether, the Coal Bearing Areas (Acquisition and Development) Act, 1957, or the CBA act.
 
According to Sudeip Shrivatsava, a Chhattisgarh-based lawyer and activist, the RRVUNL’s interpretation of the law did not stand scrutiny. Shrivatsava said that the CBA act is applicable when the coal block is owned and operated by the central government and companies owned by it. “Being a state-owned company, RRVUNL should have done the land acquisition under the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013,” he told me. “The act mandates a social-impact assessment study and gram sabha consent. This study has not been done. The state government is also complicit in this, because it should have intervened and asked for the implementation of LARR instead of CBA.” The Chhattisgarh government is yet to amend the Panchayat Raj Adhiniyam act to ensure compliance with PESA. 

This interpretation of law is not the only disputed aspect of the RRVUNL’s response. The power corporation stated to the EAC that the gram sabhas of all six villages—Salhi, Ghatbarra and Hariharpur in Surguja, and Janardhanpur and Tara in Surajpur—had issued no-objection certificates to the acquisition for the coal project. In support of this claim, RRVUNL submitted NOCs from the district collectors of Surguja and Surajpur, respectively dated 13 February and 27 March 2018. The documents claimed that the villages had issued a resolution in favour of the forest being diverted for the coal project during gram sabhas held between 24 and 27 January that year. The company further claimed that the residents of these villages had “supported the project and were convinced that the project will bring improvement to their living standard” during public consultations held the previous year.

Many residents said that they had even sent the resolutions declining their consent to the state’s tribal-welfare department. But in May 2018, the tribal-welfare department simply forwarded the NOCs that it received from the Surguja and Surajpur district collectors without making any observations about the resolutions passed by the villagers.

That month, the FAC also considered the proposal to divert the Hasdeo forest land for the Parsa coal mine, according to the minutes of the meeting. Despite recording that “the area is sensitive from erosion point of view,” the FAC did not make any recommendations against granting forest clearance for the Parsa coal project. Instead, the FAC observed that the NGT’s 2014 judgment on the PEKB did not make any observations about the Parsa block, and sought a legal opinion on whether it could grant in-principle approval to other projects in the Hasdeo forest. 

Throughout these meetings, there is no reference to the FAC or the EAC considering the unanimous rejection of the proposed project by the residents who would be affected by it. By the indications from the minutes of these meetings, the fact that the gram sabhas had time and again passed resolutions declining their consent for the projects had not been a consideration for the FAC.

“Whatever is happening right now with the coal project, is being done without our consent,” Ramlal Kariyam, a resident of Salhi, told me. “The rights of gram sabhas is what protects us from being driven away from our land and forests. We will go to court to protect our rights.”

On 24 February this year, sarpanchs of 20 gram panchayats in and around the Parsa coal block area—including the six villages that RRVUNL claimed to have received NOCs from—took an oath to protect the forests from the mining projects. That day, the sarpanchs, who gathered at Tara for the protest, also sent a letter to the ministry of tribal affairs seeking to protect their rights under PESA and FRA. The letter was signed by 243 people, and one of their main demands was the cancellation of the land-acquisition process for the Parsa block. “All land acquisition processes initiated based on statements that are forged or obtained forcefully from gram sabhas should be cancelled,” the letter stated. “This is how the procedures for Para coal block has been done.”

<a data-cke-saved-href="https://caravanmagazine.in/author/925" href="https://caravanmagazine.in/author/925" style="box-sizing: inherit; color: rgb(122, 122, 122); cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none; font-family: Montserrat, " segoe="" ui",="" roboto,="" oxygen,="" ubuntu,="" cantarell,="" "fira="" sans",="" "droid="" "helvetica="" neue",="" helvetica,="" arial,="" sans-serif;="" font-size:="" 12.8px;="" text-align:="" center;="" text-transform:="" uppercase;="" background-color:="" rgb(255,="" 255,="" 255);"="">“They have overruled the power of our gram sabhas by forging fake documents,” Kariyam told me. “Our demand is that those fake documents should be withdrawn and the clearances given to Parsa coal block should be cancelled. We are inside our houses because of the lock down, but we are discussing these over phone and social media and the fight for our rights is going on. We will return to protest once the lockdown is lifted.” (caravanmagazine.in)

The videos are now showing up in your social media feed every hour or two, each one more over-the-top than the one before — viral missives from a world that seems to have gone mad and yet somehow exists right in our backyard. These “forgotten Americans” are at the lectern at your county commission meeting if they’re not yelling at you in the produce aisle — screaming that the elected officials and their so-called scientific experts demanding they wear a mask to prevent the spread of coronavirus are really part of a vast conspiracy to take away their freedoms.

“I would also like to know where do you get the authority to reduce my oxygen,” one woman in a white “Trump Girl” shirt demanded of the Palm Beach County, Fla., commissioners as they met to issue a mandatory-mask-in-public order to fight a surge in COVID-19 cases in the Sunshine State. Her rant was not as remarkable as the fact she was just one of a stream of citizens with different variations on the same theme — that masks are a plot to subdue the masses in the name of Bill Gates or Hillary Clinton or whatever other Antichrist just popped up in their Facebook feed.
“You see that flag, I would die for that flag,” a man who called himself “an American Patriot” told the commissioners. “The Constitution that you were supposed to uphold, I would die for that! None of you are holding that up.” Others said masks were either the devil’s work or shielding sexual predators, or else provided unintentional comic relief like the woman who insisted: “I don’t wear a mask for the same reason I don’t wear underwear. ... Things gotta breathe.”

Similar sentiments echoed across Florida — “I will not be muzzled like a mad dog!” screamed one St. Lucie County man, sounding very much like a mad dog — and the United States, where residents of Huntington Beach, Calif., waved American flags and a large sign reading “NO MASKS” at motorists. But as the United States watched coronavirus cases spiral out of control in a manner that’s happened almost nowhere else in the world, the problem seemed deeper than the usual suspects of Trumpist QAnon believers. Even in “blue states,” young people packed bars and beaches and then brought COVID-19 home for Father’s Day. In Santa Cruz County, Calif., commissioners who’d tried to keep beaches closed simply gave up. “People,” a spokesperson said, “are not willing to be governed in that regard.”
The most comprehensive study published in the journal Lancet found mask-wearing could reduce the risk of coronavirus transmission from 17% to 3%. No wonder the University of Washington says universal mask-wearing in the United States would reduce the coronavirus death toll between now and October by a whopping 33,000 human beings.

Just think of all the restrictions on freedom and liberty — from the government seeing what you checked out at the library to invasive searches at the airport — to prevent another attack like 9/11 that killed 3,000 people, or less than one-tenth the toll from not wearing masks. But for millions of Americans — not a majority, mind you, but enough to cause a public-health hazard in a pandemic — the idea of masks has been launched into a different orbit where freedom talk is injected with the uniquely American viruses of free-market capitalism and media manipulation, maybe with a dollop of white supremacy.
The 1970s’ British glam-pop rockers Sweet practically predicted all of this with their 1978 smash, “Love Is Like Oxygen”: “... You get too much and get too high, not enough and you’re gonna die.” In the mask debate, just substitute the word freedom for love. Because, yes, freedom — to speak, to publish, to worship, to assemble, and to protest the government — is absolutely essential to the American experience, so much so that it’s hard to get in a “but ...”
But ... too much of the warped notion of freedom promoted by the aggressively not-mask-wearing President Trump and his No. 2, Mike Pence, and their prophets like Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity won’t just get you high — to continue with the Sweet analogy — but could also kill you by an overdose. What the radio hucksters, and the wannabe dictators they installed, won’t tell you is that freedom without any social responsibility or empathy for others is ultimately hollow.

But let’s remember that American people — even the damaged souls that you’re laughing at on Twitter today — didn’t pervert the meaning of freedom on their own. The warped modern version of liberty was sold to them, first by right-wing public intellectuals like Ayn Rand, who killed thousands of trees to wrap unbridled selfishness in her endless tomes about freedom, and later by the salesmen of Big Capitalism.
Protecting your freedom became the ideal branding for what these pitchmen really wanted, which was political cover to dramatically lower taxes on millionaires (who, thanks to that, would become billionaires) and to crush unions and their demands for higher pay, freeing up profits to now pay CEOs 350 times what the average worker makes. Talk about finding the cost of freedom! With the help of academics like the Nobel economist James McGill Buchanan, backed by billionaires like the Koch brothers, warped freedom capitalism got a fancy name — free-market libertarianism. But by the 1970s, their new form of snake-oil salesmanship was threatened by the avatars of a newer “knowledge economy.”

Confronted with scientific realities like man-made climate change, the forces of conservative libertarianism turned their guns toward expertise, with the goals of thwarting environmentalism and keeping corporate profits high. The bills for global warming are starting to come due, but that has been superseded for the time being by the COVID-19 crisis; the lack of trust for medical expertise from Main Street all the way to an ignorant president whom 62 million Main Streeters installed at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue has proved lethal.

No other nation has botched its coronavirus response so badly because no other nation holds science in such low esteem. “Who made you perpetrators over my life?” the self-proclaimed Trump Girl demanded of the experts at the Palm Beach County meeting. In a recent Washington Post op-ed, Stanford psychiatry prof Keith Humphreys noted that the United States simply can’t impose a coronavirus testing regimen like South Korea or Singapore because we don’t trust the government on public health. “Clusters of gun-toting protesters opposing public health measures are a real — and uniquely American — problem,” he wrote, “but it’s the much more prevalent distrust in government’s role in public health that would curtail the success of any test, trace and isolate program.”
In a functioning society, freedom can flourish when it’s part of a broader social compact, when liberty is not abused because its practitioners also see themselves as part of a community, where they care about others — even, or especially, when it comes to wearing a mask and not spreading germs to your neighbor. But has there ever been a branding campaign as successful as America repackaging selfishness, self-interest, and extreme inequality as personal freedom?

That’s even true of the freedom that’s so central to my work life: the free press that exists under the First Amendment. I’ve seen how that only works well when publishers fuel their press freedom with common sense and an understanding of responsibility to the readers. In the internet age, the promise of an even greater media freedom has been polluted by billionaires from Fox’s Rupert Murdoch to Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, who made bigger profits off lies and unchecked conspiracy theories than off fact-checking in the public interest. The filth of Zuckerberg’s Facebook is what’s spewing, unmasked, from the self-styled “patriots” of Palm Beach County.

There’s something else going here, and in the age of George Floyd it cannot be ignored. As Nancy MacLean chronicled in her award-winning Democracy in Chains about the above-mentioned James McGill Buchanan, his think-tank crusade to promote libertarianism was initially rooted in preserving Southern school segregation, or white supremacy. Over the last 50 or so years, much of what conservatives have hyped as threats to personal liberty were really proposed checks on white (or male) privilege.

White supremacy is, at its diseased heart, a quest for a kind of cultural immortality. As the global pandemic advanced and as evidence mounted that COVID-19 is most lethal not just for the elderly but also for Black and brown Americans, it seems clear that for some white people, not wearing a mask isn’t just a freedom song but a defiant proclamation of their superiority. That’s validated every day by America’s white-supremacist-in-chief, whose refusal to wear a mask in public is in fact a different kind of mask, one of his deep insecurity. This toxic blend of narcissism and white privilege is Donald Trump’s idea of leadership — even as he leads some of his voters to an early grave.

The flip side is that the millions who’ve marched in America’s streets after George Floyd’s murder — many, although not all, from the under-35 generation — are making the case that a better world, built around empathy and compassion for people who don’t look like ourselves, is coming. They are using their freedom of speech and assembly to forge a more perfect union, and I fervently wish that the 33,000 Americans who may be doomed by a lethal injection of phony liberty can somehow live to see it. (inquirer.com)