Swapan Dasgupta on Jairam Ramesh’s arbitariness and malevolent political calculations; Odisha is the worst affected
CENTER & ODISHA, ENVIRONMENT, EXPOSING ANTI-ODISHA-GROWTH SCHEMES January 8th. 2011, 10:56pmFollowing is an excerpt from Swapan Dasgupta’s article in the Telegraph.
… The last occasion Singh spoke publicly on the unending growth versus environment controversy was at a media interaction on September 6 last year. Asked about industry’s fear of the rampaging minister for environment, Jairam Ramesh, the PM proffered what seemed a tangential answer. We have, he said, no intention of reverting to the licence-permit raj.
The answer was revealing. Having played a part in blunting the jagged edges of over-regulation, Singh was able to see the headline-grabbing actions of Ramesh for what they really are: a resuscitation of controls, using a ‘green’ cover.
… The rise and rise of Jairam Ramesh has been one of the most astonishing stories of 2010. An apparatchik with not even a hint of a mass base, he is today arguably the most powerful minister in the UPA-II government. He has become to economic policy what Pranab Mukherjee is to political management. His reputation isn’t based on his success in making India a more green and pleasant land but on his penchant for saying ‘no’. In a polity where real power lies with the states, he has made his ministry the instrument of the Centre’s intrusiveness, with devastating consequences.
Ramesh’s ‘achievements’ are awesome. He has blocked the largest foreign direct investment of Rs 51,000 crore by Posco in Orissa, stymied the emergence of India as the largest aluminium producing hub in the world, disrupted the Rs 2,000 crore initial public offering of the first private sector-created hill station of Lavasa in Maharashtra, and put a spanner in the works of two Jindal-promoted steel plants in Orissa and Chhattisgarh. The opportunity costs of his veto may well equal the Mahatma Gandhi national rural employment guarantee scheme budget!
That’s not all. He has unilaterally flouted all guidelines and committed India at Cancún to positions that could undermine national sovereignty and jeopardize the country’s future growth. He has shifted the parameters of India’s environment diplomacy at both Copenhagen and Cancún, disregarding the advice of India’s tried-and-tested negotiators. What is particularly striking is the dreary frequency with which he has personally repudiated the inviolable red lines of India’s global positions, much to the amusement of the rest of the world.
In between, he has questioned the government’s approach to national security during a visit to China and batted shamelessly for Chinese companies, presumably in pursuit of his Chindia pipe dream. More astonishing, Ramesh has done all this and more after repeatedly rubbing the PM and senior cabinet colleagues the wrong way.
A lesser politician would have been shown the door and made to cool his heels on the back benches. Shashi Tharoor (before his political hara-kiri) was ticked off by party bigwigs for his harmless displays of public-school humour on Twitter. But Ramesh has emerged unscathed from all the controversies and, indeed, grown from strength to strength. He even considered it prudent to level a blanket accusation at the entire political class, claiming harassment by members of parliament lobbying for corporates that have been stung by his decisions.
There are activists who see Ramesh as the best thing since sliced bread: a doughty ‘green’ crusader who is not afraid of doing what is right and playing by the rule book. He has, they say, put environmental activism on the map of India, not least by heeding Medha Patkar on Lavasa, Bianca Jagger on Vedanta and Greenpeace on Posco, appointing National Advisory Council activists to expert committees, and being influenced by internationally-funded advocacy groups on climate change. If public opinion in India was shaped by earnest graduates of American liberal arts colleges and environmental journalists, Ramesh would have been top dog politically — with the added attribute that he is ‘very close’ to the equally earnest heir apparent.
Unfortunately, life isn’t all black and white. Behind Ramesh’s fearless willingness to kick all polluters in the butt lurk malevolent political calculations. The minister, for example, played with a straight bat on the airport in Navi Mumbai. He made Praful Patel sweat, shed tears for the mangrove swamps and then proceeded to clear the project with token caveats. The stakes were just too high and any non-clearance would have led to him being roasted alive by the state Congress.
Equally, he deemed the Jaitapur nuclear power plant of strategic importance and linked it with the Indo-US nuclear agreement. In a different context, he would have waved a report by the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, describing the project as a “social disaster”, to issue an immediate ‘stop work’ notice. This time, the protests didn’t matter because they were, in his view, “politics on the pretext of environment”.
He should know. The stay on Vedanta’s Niyamgiri project was timed to allow Rahul Gandhi his “sipahi” moment. The dispute in Lavasa arose out of a turf battle: should the clearances have come from the Maharashtra government or the Centre? In the case of Posco, Vedanta and Jindal, brownie points were earned by deflating Naveen Patnaik’s aspirational balloon. Additionally, in the case of Posco, there was the delight of undermining the prime minister, who had taken a personal interest in the successful completion of the project. Presumably, from Ramesh’s perspective, these decisions didn’t amount to playing “politics on the pretext of environment”.
There were other sub-texts as well. The Lavasa promoter, it is widely believed, was tarred and made to suffer a huge loss of business credibility for supposedly being ‘close’ to Sharad Pawar. A project which began in 2004 and has more or less completed its first phase was ordered by Ramesh’s ministry to restore status quo ante! The order was subsequently modified but it revealed a mindset. In the case of Vedanta, N.C. Saxena, a member of the inquiry committee, recently admitted to The Indian Express that the decision would have been different if the company had given jobs to 500 local tribals. Posco was asked by Ramesh’s ministry to commit some Rs 3,000 crore to a corporate social responsibility programme as a precondition of clearance. These may be worthwhile political calculations, but they were certainly not “green” considerations.
In a recent interview, Ramesh claimed that “I want to professionalise the system of decision-making. I have proposed the establishment of a National Environmental Assessment and Monitoring Authority — a professional body, independent of the Ministry.” This may well happen in the future but, for the moment, Ramesh has made the ministry of environment a celebration of discretion and arbitrariness. He has merrily set about adding to the scope of his jurisdiction, taking on non-Congress state governments and overturning existing clearances. His ‘green’ norms are breathtakingly simple — “show me the person, I’ll show you the rule.” That, many would say, is what defines governance in India.
January 8th, 2011 at 11:37 pm
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January 10th, 2011 at 6:52 am
People forget thet Jairam Ramesh is undoing many wrongs of the past and hence objections are tumbling out one after another. He is perhaps the only environment minister of independent India who has the guts to speak and do what is right. He may not have been able to stop much but has made a huge impact on greedy industrialists who have scant regard for environment and local people. Swapan Dasgupta has given a one sided report. Thats his style…you can see him putting his foot in his own mouth everyday on national television.
January 12th, 2011 at 8:21 am
I don’t see any wrong in what Sir Jayaram Ramesh doing. I can remember those days when T.N. Sesan finally made Election commission look like what it is supposed to do.
January 12th, 2011 at 12:59 pm
The problem is he is being selective. He okayed Polavaram even after CMs complained. (Only much later he did a slight backtrack) He has okayed Navi Mumbai airport with changes. But when it comes to Odisha his approach is different. Also, from his past actions he is anti-Odisha and his actions are greatly harming Odisha.
January 12th, 2011 at 7:37 pm
Jairam Ramesh’s actions are not all black and white. Perhaps that is what Swapan Dasgupta is trying to suggest and I have to agree with that. Jairam Ramesh however much a crusader or pathfinder is bound by certain political compulsions, naturally based on economic support for the Congress party, though he would like the world to believe otherwise.
About his anti-Odisha stance, if at all, I am not sure where that comes from. If it is true then one has to investigate much deeper for this so called feeling. Often such feelings are the result of some serious differences at college (a bright Odiya boy in his class/a bad Odiya professor) or in the workplace (perhaps some Odiya IAS officer whom he never liked etc.) or plain parochial feelings (Bengalis not liking Odiyas etc.). In any case if it is true then it says a lot about the governance of this country.
January 12th, 2011 at 11:56 pm
Mr. Jairam Ramesh has also okayed Jaitpur Nuclear Powe project in Maharashtra which falls in biodiversity areas of Western Ghats. Approval to Navi Mumbai Airport and Jaitpur nuclear plant came almost a week after Prithviraj Chavan took over as CM of Maharashtra. Chavan was colleague of Ramesh before he resigned to be appointed as CM.
January 13th, 2011 at 12:06 pm
We are forgeting that Vedanta and POSCO are money making private enterprises run by businessmen and they cannot be compared with public interest projects like Mumbai airport or Polavaram. We are also forgetting that Jairam Ramesh cleared the Brutanga project in Orissa meant to benefit farmers. I agree with Chandra. Seshan was a hated man when he put his foot down but what he did was great work.
January 14th, 2011 at 5:31 am
I really don’t know who is right or wrong, but here is some facts(though i don’t have any data points) about excessive Industrialization.I have shifted to BBSR for last 2 years, and i have seen this city growing much faster then any other city in india(no doubt on this)
1) Now Roads are much wider..4 lanes..6 lanes. but where is the roadside trees?
2)Now there are city buses..autos..but where is natural breeze that was flowing through BBSR even during hot summer when we travel by rickshaw
3)Now we have high end apartments..luxury..But where is the same old communities which we used to..land prices have now quardapulled..it is out of hands of any common man..People who have made BBSR their home when it was founded 50 years ago
4) Now we have malls..A/C shopping arcades. But still we have Power cuts during peak summer..low voltages due to which we can’t sleep…even if we are setting plants we can’t seem to generate enough power
5) We have new age industries..every now and then i got to know one more group from the TV (AMF, PARIBAS, GREEN INDIA, SEASHORE…etc) but where is the Corporate Social Responsibility…
These were entirely my thoughts. We are seeing the repercussions in the shape of unusual heat waves…delayed monsoons (for last 2 years) untimely rains..unusual hard or light winter. No wonder this is the second consecutive year when the crops failed to yield properly becasue of weather and food prices still rmeain high.
January 14th, 2011 at 10:19 am
@Chandra: Interesting observations.
(1) Roads – I have to agree with you. I am not a resident of Bhubaneswar but whenever I went to the city in the last couple of years I noticed that the government was busy cutting down trees to make wider roads. This in itself is nothing unusual if there was some plan to re-plant trees along the roadside. Perhaps there should be a sustained campaign to make the city green before things go out of hand. I would suggest reach out to the media (The Telegraph group is doing some good socially responsible reporting at least), reach out to NGOs so that they can put some pressure on the government/administration. The government needs to be pushed because our tenured babus really don’t move otherwise.
As for the other points well that is the nature of development! You win some you lose some you can’t have it all. But definitely these are important issues to think about. Genuine and concerned citizens should organize groups to ensure their needs are not overlooked.