Summer in India has been merciless this year, with many states recording temperatures above 42 degrees Celsius and rising reports of fatalities. Despite these harsh conditions, urban support continues for development projects that clear trees, wetlands, mangroves, and forests near cities. A recent Article 14 report provides data on thousands of trees that will soon be sacrificed nationally for infrastructure projects. Those opposing such unscientific large-scale tree felling are often labelled 'tree-huggers', 'anti-development' and 'anti-nationals'. While capitalism accelerates environmental degradation and the world faces a growing climate crisis, societal divisions deepen. Yet, we give trees too little credit: Beings necessary…
Another insightful article.
I have couple of suggestion to add. In many apartment complexes, the cost of water (whether due to tanker supply or bore water or Cauvery) is a shared cost. This cost is normally recovered as a part of maintenance fee from residents, which is normally a function of area of the individual apartment. There is *no* billing based on actual usage.
If we want to start looking at water as a precious resource, we need to also enforce metering and charging based on usage, at an individual apartment level. Otherwise, it will be a tale of tragedy of commons – with no incentive for reduced water usage/wastage and no penalties for excess usage.
For usage of bore-wells and rain-water harvesting, again similar principles should be applied. Water drawn from bore-well must be charged on metered basis (at a cost lesser than what is charged for Cauvery) and rain-water harvested should be rewarded monetarily (similar to how one can earn money today by supplying solar power to the grid).
We need to rejuvenate all the lakes in and around Bangalore some more lakes which are large and can help us with quenching the water issue if we dont act now this city will be a ghost city without water.
– Jigani Lake
– Hulimangala Lake
– Bedduru Kere Lake
– 4 Lakes in Bannerghatta Area
– Gottigere Lake
– Arekere Lake