Policy for the environment kept under wraps
The Union cabinet recently approved the National Environment Policy (nep). The country's environmentalists should ordinarily have greeted this announcement with applause. After all, a policy with a holistic vision to safeguard India's ecolo-gical security was long overdue. But strangely, no celebrations marked the announcement. Why?
The Union ministry of environment and forests (moef) had first put up a draft nep for public comments in August 2004. The faultlines were apparent even then. An open letter sent to moef in late 2004, by over 90 environmental organisations and activists in the country, pointed out that the process of drafting the policy was opaque and undemocratic, despite moef 's claim to have had extensive consultations. ngos known for their environmental record were hardly involved. Not a single local community, the sector that depends most heavily on the environment, was consulted. The draft was initially put up only in English, and only on a website, rendering it out of reach of the majority. Due to substantial protest, a Hindi copy was put up, and the time for public comments extended. Even elected representatives in panchayats, nagarpalikas, and legislatures were left out, and members of parliament received the draft after some of them raised a stink.
The draft contained serious internal contradictions, with some good elements being negated by an overall tendency to subordinate environmental concerns to short-term interests. It displayed a very strong
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