Joshimath - Danger Ahead

Beginning of the year saw a cataclysmic play of events ,in the pilgrim town of Joshimath , in Uttarakhand, a gateway to Badrinath and a critical component of the 'char dham ' itinerary for a devout Hindu. The entire town of twenty thousand people saw a unique case of subsidence in almost a quarter of its built up construction . This drives a chill down the spine of every resident in Joshimath, and makes mountain dwellers in the upper reaches of Himalayas, ponder over their future .

In the name of development many things have preceded this crisis . For one , nearly 800 kms of roads were either widened or built afresh in the last five years in the state of Uttarakhand alone. Hydroelectric projects which were stuck for environmental reasons have been given a fresh impetus.

Every nation along the Himalayas loves dams for their cheap hydro power. It is quite a misnomer to suggest that hydro power is green in nature . It is not ! The destruction and degradation of the environment which goes into trapping increasingly scarce water resources in higher altitudes is seen to be believed and the damage untenable.

In a post 'The Race to Dam the Himalayas' written for New York Times by Sunil S. Amrith , the author says "More than 400 dams are under construction, or planned for the coming decades, in Bhutan, India, Nepal and Pakistan; at least 100 more have been proposed across the Chinese border in Tibet. If the plans come to fruition, this will be one of the world’s most heavily dammed regions. But these projects will aggravate international tensions. They carry grave ecological risks.'

Back home in India, and to the issue in question , the M C Mishra committee appointed in 1976 , clearly explained that Joshimath was situated on an old landslide zone and could sink, if development continued unabated, Mishra recommended that construction should be prohibited in Joshimath. The 18 member committee which was formed then, laid out a set of recommendations such as -

Joshimath is a deposit of sand and stone — it is not the main rock — hence it was not suitable for a township. Vibrations produced by blasting, heavy traffic, etc., will lead to a disequilibrium in natural factors…

Construction should only be allowed after examining the load-bearing capacity of the soil and the stability of the site, restrictions should also be imposed on the excavation of slopes.

It had said that for road repairs and other construction work, it was advisable not to remove the boulders by digging or blasting the hill side. Also, in the landslide areas, stones and boulders should not be removed from the bottom of the hill as it would remove toe support, increasing the possibility of landslides.

It advised against cutting trees in the landslide zone, and said that extensive plantation work should be undertaken in the area, particularly between Marwari and Joshimath, to conserve soil and water resources.

It was imperative that the local people were provided with alternative sources of fuel

Agriculture on the slopes must be avoided.

Water seepage in the area is profuse, therefore to prevent any more landslides in the future, the seepage of open rain water must be stopped by the construction of a pucca drainage system.

To prevent the erosion of the river bank, cement blocks should be placed in vulnerable spots on the bank

Fairly simple and sensible , one would observe . Over the years neither the government nor the town municipality apparently followed much of these laid out norms. They even went about and flouted every recommendation with impunity. To quote some of the excesses , the Tapovan Vishnugad hydro electric project in the vicinity of the town , entailed an underground tunnel of 20 km length which obviously needed to be drilled and the stones blasted. This drilling apparently punctured a large unconfined aquifer , which meant that water was flowing underground and creating its own path removing earth and creating vacuum, along its path all the time.

when the news about the subsidence of Joshimath emerged , for a while it got every body's attention and on every aspect , on every element , the cracks in the buildings , displaced people and their rehabilitation , the warnings from the experts , reports of dangers of large scale construction in the vicinity , the focus on pleas and helplessness from the various NGO's in the area , cameras capturing the distress of the people and many such nuances.

One month later , the lights seemed to have gone off - there was very  little coverage of the aftermath! No follow up on the policy changes, the recovery process envisaged etc. Even the experts and NGOs , turned quiet. Two months , after the incident , there is hardly anything to be heard - from citizens , NGT , courts , activists, agencies and the government. why is that ?

let us take a step back and examine the bigger picture. On a day , when large scale cracks and cave-ins were recorded , the establishment in Dehra Dun , was taking a different line altogether. A delegation from Chamoli district ,where Joshimath is , met the chief minister to urgently order an enquiry and take steps to stop the NTPC led power project as they believed it to be the cause of the problem. The answer was a swift 'no' from him and the administration. Until the residents of the Joshimath held a protest on the night of the 5th of December , the local and the state administration did pretty much nothing!

A petition in the high court by an activist and a similar one in the supreme court brought about a directive and forced the administration into declaring the area as a national disaster zone and invoking the disaster management act into service. All this reversal was in a matter of a week.

To makes matters worse A preliminary report released the following week, by the Indian Space Research Organisation’s National Remote Sensing Centre, showed a “rapid subsidence” event in parts of Joshimath , while it showed “slow subsidence” up to 8.9 cm within Joshimath town. This was recorded over a period of 7 months since April 2022 . Another Cartosat-2S satellite data acquired by ISRO, recorded “rapid subsidence” of around 5 cm in just 12 days since December 27.

A day after ISRO publicized its assessment that showed Joshimath sank by 5.4 cm in 12 days, the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) issued a gag order on a dozen government institutions and officials. This was on sharing data on social media and commenting in the media on "their own interpretations" of the land subsidence episode in Uttarakhand. Not surprisingly the ISRO pulled the report down from its website immediately. The administration also picked up a few cases of hotel buildings that had flouted or breached construction norms in the town precinct and demanded an immediate demolition as they were posing a risk to 40 big and small homes, shops and other structures in the vicinity.. When the matter of compensation  came up , it was offhandedly refused, which caused the affected owners and the locals to protest again and this became the focus of the cameras for a while, along with the demolition process. This turned into a 'news worthy ' event to the embarrassment of the government .

The chief minister had to personally get involved ,  for the eviction of families from their homes when they were reluctant to leave in spite of the danger , then for their rehabilitation to safer areas, and later for relief and compensation to people .An 18-member committee was formed for all remedial and coordinated action , which was a positive move .

While the people and the administration grappled with the recovery and rehabilitation process in the town and in the district of chamoli in general, the bigger question on everyone's mind was about the future. By the end of the third week of January , just a little under two weeks after the occurrence of the large scale subsidence , the administration , was quick to declare normalcy. Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami, was quoted by all mainstream news media as saying "around 65% to 70% of the people in the town are living a normal life. The Chief Minister also added that "the Char Dham Yatra will kick off in four months".

Now this has becomes a point of contention for any ecologist worthy of their name. Also this almost immediate stated recovery does not assuage environmental concerns in any manner. We can understand the chief minister trying to get things back to normal and the whole process of tourism going for economic reasons. Yet ! This attitude is an indication of not having learnt from the incident and of a system that is geared to fall back and do more of the same. This is indeed worrying ?

So , one question that is asked by many including the residents is - What happens now to the power project in the vicinity ? What happens to the road construction and other development projects near Joshimath and elsewhere? The answer reveals itself perhaps, between the lines of the 'life is now normal' statement from the administration. While the work was temporarily halted at the power project , there are reports of the tunnel activity seeing some resumption .Before we get uptight on the specifics , it makes sense to look at the history of this particular project and others in the area .

The 'Tapovan Vishnugad' is a 520 megawatt capacity run-of-river project being constructed on Dhauliganga River in the Chamoli District of Uttarakhand. It was commissioned in 2006, slated to be operational by 2013. The project apparently involves the construction of a head race tunnel (HRT) , which involves building , rather boring through in parts by blasting , drilling and in most parts using a tunnel boring machine . The tunnel boring machine or the TBM has seen some mishaps - In 2009 it broke into an aquifer resulting in ingress of water into the tunnel. Then, it got stuck many times inside the tunnel and once, for many months towards the end of 2012 . Broadly the project was delayed for myriad reason and the work stopped abruptly after the 2013 Kedarnath floods which took an estimated 6000 lives in the state. The project was recommissioned in 2016 and by then the cost of doing the project had more than doubled . It again took the brunt of floods because of  an avalanche in February 2021, where sadly as many as 180 of its personnel lost their lives. Now in 2023, it is where it is, still incomplete !

The chief minister and the officials in the government reacted quite sharply negatively to the accusation about the power project being the cause for the subsidence in Joshimath . While most of the experts and the locals felt that the project did play a part in disturbing the eco system , the government did not see it that way. It is understandably invested in the project and cannot let go.

The Power Minister R K Singh on the 3rd of February said the area of subsidence in Joshimath was 15 km upstream from the components of the Tapovan-Vishnugad hydropower project and there were no signs of the sinking of ground around its tunnel alignment.

In a written reply to a question in the Lok Sabha, Singh said land subsidence in Joshimath was "a very old issue" observed way back in 1976 and the M C Mishra Committee set up by the then state government listed "hill wash, natural angle of repose, cultivation area, because of seepage and soil erosion" as probable causes for cracks in the Himalayan town. The minister said a multi-institutional committee set up by the state authorities last July had made no mention of NTPC Tapovan-Vishnugad hydropower project causing land subsidence in Joshimath. Singh conveniently left out the crucial facts of blasting of hillsides and that pertained to flouting of construction norms mentioned in the very M C Mishra report he chose to refer to.

We are on the side, reminded of national interests . We are told that India needs to match up to China , in terms of defense buildup , hence connectivity is crucial . Also that the hill people themselves want connectivity and development. Does this become a consideration and also an excuse to do exactly as what China does - being aggressive with dams on its rivers and highways cutting through mountains. Are there no viable options ? Have we become closed and incapable of thinking of any other alternative means to address issues of military or development. Can a citizen even desire that we become a soft power instead of a showy nation ?

The question is not whether a remote hilly area at a high altitude should see development or its people seek a better quality of life ! The question is that of the long term safety of the very same citizens and danger of irreversible damage to their environment !Therefore , every step even if it is based on the needs of the people of the area ,needs to be evaluated by the administration.

One gets an impression that the evaluation is simply missing! Take this premise as an example .It has been pointed out that even if social and environmental costs are set aside, big hydropower projects are no longer economically viable. The cost of power from them is not less than Rs.6-7 per unit; cheaper power is available in the grid and from alternatives like solar and wind. The biggest evidence of this is the fact that the private sector is overwhelmingly uninterested in hydro projects and I would hazard to say that all of the hydro projects are built on government funds. In the near vicinity of Joshimath there is a slew of Hydro power projects , which include the already operating, 400 MW Vishnu Prayag Hydro Electric Project, the 520 MW Tapovan Vishnugad Hydropower Plant which is under construction, and the World Bank-funded 444 MW Vishnugad-Pipalkoti Hydro Electric Project which is also under construction. All this when India's reliance on Hydro power is merely 12% of its total installed capacity and as a strategy apparently ,does not allow for great savings either . While at the same time it comes with serious environmental and social baggage. The least that the government can do is to clarify its strategy regarding hydro power or it will be assumed that they are ill-informed or worse, they simply do not care !

On this often talked about development aspect around Joshimath , there are various other projects lined up as well , which could be considered ecologically sensitive - there is the widening of the 5.5 km-long Helang-Marwari Char Dham highway, Asia’s longest Joshimath-Auli ropeway project, and the Rishikesh to Karnaprayag railway line, among others. It is well known and documented that the entire Char Dham highway project did not have an Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) report, environment appraisal, management plan or approval in the first place .The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways - conceived the project by dividing it into 55 stages of less than 100 kms in length each, which meant they did not need an EIA clearance. Though this was condoned by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) as well as the judiciary, it is still seen as a service to the people of the area and not as any serious breach of norms by the state and the central government.

So where does all this finally lead up to? Some of the projects have been halted like the ropeway project. Maybe we could see some others halted or reconsidered. The power projects will end up resuming or it likely already has , going by the reaction of the ministers and officials .The road work involving the char dham highway project, in all probabilities will resume once the residents quieten down a bit in Chamoli and Joshimath and of course, it shall face no hindrance elsewhere in Uttarakhand. Transparency will take a back seat under the guise of National Disaster Management and things will be managed as if there was no disaster.

A pliant media certainly helps the government's cause .The NGOs operating in the area will have no voice or theirs will not be heard adequately for this reason . The insincere ones will put a price on their peace and more people will take this easy way out . The contractors and agencies will manage the rest .

The notable Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology , an institution under the Department of science and technology of the government of India was set up solely for the sustainability of the Himalayan region in all manner. They are to provide sane advisory on these matters but have unfortunately remained largely quiet and in some cases even distorted reports to suit the agenda of development in the Himalayas.

Well ! It is a dangerous cocktail going forward and we can soon expect the next edition of the disaster waiting to happen.