Eco-Sensitive Area (ESA) is a protection being proposed to the Western Ghats of the six Western Ghats states. ESA will safeguard the Western Ghats from exploitation and ensure water security, food security and your right to fresh air, the most basic necessities for our existence. These are your fundamental human rights too, and equally your children's. You can guess where the hurdles to declaring ESA for the Western Ghats lie. Despite multiple reminders through court orders, successive governments, especially in Karnataka, have chosen instead to remain steadfast in its rejection of the report on a strong political and lobby grounding.
ESA is our right, demand it to be finalised! Only we can collectively be responsible for our future!
What is ESA?
On 6th July 2022, for the fifth time, the Ministry of Environment, Forest & Climate Change (MoEF&CC) issued a notification identifying 37% of the Western Ghats as ecologically sensitive. Ecologically sensitive area is a region of high ecological importance that cannot be compromised due to life sustaining functions they provide, like giving birth to 64 rivers of south India and sustaining them in Karnataka alone. Collectively, the rivers of the Western Ghats feed 250 million people in peninsular India. (This sole reason is good enough to demand ESA in the Western Ghats!)
Identified Eco-sensitive Area (ESA) includes forests - Protected Areas (PA), World Heritage Sites, villages and towns, including their agricultural farmlands and plantations falling in the Western Ghats region of these states. Notification of ESA will function as a "shock absorber" - with varying degrees of protection against polluting industries and pollution in the Western Ghats villages and towns.
The Western Ghats High Level Working Group has recommended prohibition and regulation of identified projects and activities in the ecologically sensitive area which have maximum interference and destructive impacts on the ecosystems of the Western Ghats. Such projects include:
- Mining
- New Thermal power plants
- Building and construction above 20,000 sq.m., (Vidhana Soudha is approx. 22,000 sq.m.) area development projects above 50 Ha, and built-up area above 1,50,000 sq. m.
- Airports and Commercial Air Strips
- Ports/Harbours/Jetties
- Big Hotels and Resorts having overall waste water generation @ 100 KLD and more
- Sugar Mills
- Pharmaceutical companies
- Nuclear Power Plants
- Cement Plants
Where is ESA?
The identified 37% of ESA, is an area of 59,940 sq. km. across six states of Gujarat (449 sq. km.) , Maharashtra (17340 sq. km.), Goa (1461 sq. km.), Karnataka (20,668 sq. km.), Tamil Nadu (6914 sq. km.) & Kerala. MoEF&CC has identified areas as above, whereas Kerala has undertaken a physical verification of ESA. Accordingly, Kerala has identified 9993.7 sq. km. which includes 9107 sq. km. of protected forests and 886.7 sq. km. of non-forested area. It reduced the protection area in contrast to 13,108 sq. km. recommended by the earlier Kasturirangan panel report.
Why ESA? (Purpose)
Western Ghats is an important geological land form on the fringe of the west coast of India.
- It is the origin of prominent rivers like Godavari, Krishna, Kaveri & Tungabhadra, and a number of other rivers. Hence it is called the Water tower of peninsular India. These series of hills lie in the western part of peninsular India with undulating terrains sustaining the perennial and seasonal rivers of south India, ensuring the water and food security of southern India's 250 million people.
- Apart from being the catchment area of all these rivers, the Western Ghats is a global biodiversity hotspot and a treasure trove of biological diversity. It hosts 4,600 species of flowering plants with 38% endemics, 330 butterflies with 11% endemics, 197 reptiles with 52% endemics, 529 birds with 4% endemics, 161 mammals with 9% endemics, 343 fishes with 31% endemics and 248 amphibians with 62% endemics.
- This endemism is inter-dependent on the region to support sustenance of important domesticated plant species such as pepper, cardamom, cinnamon, mango and jackfruit, apart from paddy, coffee and other important food and commercial crops.
Propaganda
Based on common false propaganda against ESA draft notification, the following activities are NOT prohibited in the Western Ghats:
- Whereas, the draft notification clearly states there are no restrictions in change of legal ownership of property in Eco Sensitive Areas.
- Ongoing agriculture and horticulture commercial cropping / plantations.
- Construction and repair of residential houses of people who are currently living in these villages.
- Running of hospitals and healthcare centres.
- Vehicular movement, including for commercial purposes.
- The right of common people is still in place, as the notification clearly states that the prior informed consent under FRA 2006 shall comply with, and the consent of Grama Sabhas is mandatory for undertaking projects and activities.
- Use of any colour paints for homes, instead of falsely claimed green paints only.
Every time an attempt has been made to notify an ecologically sensitive region of the Western Ghats, there has been violent and misguided protests.
In Kerala, church led groups, quarry, mining, timber, real-estate, and hotels & resorts mafias, through false propaganda, have succeeded in falsifying the threats to the farming and indigenous communities residing in forest fringes of Wayanad and Idukki districts of Kerala. The precedent was seen when the Madhav Gadgil Committee (WGEEP) recommended 64% of the Western Ghats be notified as eco-sensitive area where they recommended a complete ban on activities like mining, quarrying and highly polluting industries.
The protests on the basis of falsified propaganda by similar vested interests erupted against the Kasturinrangan Committee's recommendation of notifying only 37% of the Western Ghats as ecologically sensitive. This time there were environmental and conservation groups as well protesting, although for the insufficiency of protection afforded by this committee in comparison to the WGEEP's recommendation.
The proposal to form some kind of “Shock Absorber” around protected areas through transition zones from areas of high protection to areas involving lesser protection has ever since been met with protests and boycott for self-serving and nefarious reasons of politically and commercially vested interested groups with exploitative intent.
Like the coercion in the case of Kerala's government's physical verification of ESA, that saw a reduction of the ESA from 13,108 sq. km. to 9993.7 sq. km., out of which 9107 sq. km. is forest land already protected under existing Forest Conservation Act (FCA) and Wildlife Protection Act (WPA). The demarcation of just 886.7 sq. km. of ESA has allowed Kerala to skillfully divert over 3000 operating quarries into existence, making the current exercise a redundant one affording no reprieve whatsoever.
By rejecting the MoEF&CC’s proposal and instead constituting its own ESA has witnessed a serious lack of contemplation with consequences like the successive landslides being witnessed, with several mishaps in Idukki, Wayanad and Malappuram in 2018, 2019 and 2022 too! In Karnataka, Kodagu has also seen similar landslides during the same period that impact the 'right to life' and 'livelihoods' of local people. The vested interests are indirectly asking for quarrying, mining, large scale projects and land conversions be permitted in these fragile hill slopes and valleys.
Who should support it and Why?
People of the Ghats must support ESA -
- Your legal ownership is not compromised
- Your water security for financial security depends on it
Your financial security from subsistence and commercial crops depend on the sustained and predictable availability of fresh water and supporting bio-diversity - Malenadu, Malabar, or Konkan, your children will not see the Western Ghats of today like you did, if you allow unabated 'development' intrude into this sensitive region.
People of the plains (Bengaluru, Mysuru, Mandya,...) must support ESA -
- Your food security is dependent on the water and soil security of the farms and plantations in the region. Their health depends on the forests in the Western Ghats.
- Your water security is dependent on the health of the forests in the Western Ghats from where flows Kaveri, Kabini, Tungabhadra, Sharavathi, Krishna, Godavari, and plenty many rivers. Borewell, bottled mineral water, and reverse osmosis water purification plants -ALL of them depend on fresh source of water.
- For instance, if Kaveri does not flow, farmers in Mysuru, Mandya and onward districts will be the largest affected people in the plains. And indirectly the people in Bengaluru who depend on these regions to feed us.
- The stability of the region's climate is most crucial for your coffee security, tea security, and all kinds of spices that are dominant in Kerala and Karnataka. They are dependent on timely flowering and fruiting of these plants. If the rain is off by a week, or if it rains excessively during the wrong month, if summer like condition extends by a month, all the security will gets compromised. For which, again, we need to demand ESA!
Additional objections : Voice of the people of Western Ghats
- Stop ecologically destructive projects and activities like mining and large infrastructure projects (highways widening and railway lines) that could irreversibly damage the Western Ghats and impact the well-being of our future generations. In a small district like Kodagu with 4100 sq. km., we do not need 5 national highways widening and 2 railways that are planned to serve the State of Kerala.
- Prohibit highly polluting industries like the Union Carbides, Unilevers, and Sterlites operating in our Western Ghats that can drain and contaminate our sources of drinking water to locals and millions of people living downstream. Also ensure there is better riparian buffer protection for all rivers in the Western Ghats.
- Prohibit unscientific and illogical large power projects like Sharavathi/ Varahi pump storage plants and nuclear power plants that could completely decimate our beautiful Kaans and Myristica swamps, and pollute our underground water systems, which are the sources of drinking water for many generations to come.
- Ban land conversion of plantation lands and paddy fields for commercial purposes such as township, villas, gated communities, weekend homes, resorts etc. which leads to urbanization in the Western Ghats. Unscientific land conversion is leading to landslides in western Ghats, as is being witnessed in the recent heavy rains!
- Ban exotic and detrimental monocultures like Palm, Acacia and Eucalyptus plantations in Western Ghats that destroy our paddy lands, forests and trigger man-animal conflicts. Invasive species, blocking animal corridors for large scale destruction projects are triggering human animal conflicts.
Adherence to the principle of sustainable development is a constitutional requirement. An ESA village is a safe village for the farmers and its people. We appeal to the higher sense among the public and the policy makers necessary to promote continued land use in a fair and inter-generationally equitable manner.
Sign your support demanding an ESA in the Western Ghats. Our present and your children's future depends on the Western Ghats.
Demand ESA, it is our right to life!
_______
Sources (a few):