Deafening Silence on the Environment In India’s Elections

AS THE GREAT Indian election tamasha winds down, many are feeling good about how the country has pulled off what S.Y. Quraishi, the former chief election commissioner, describes as “ not only the biggest election of the world, (but) probably… the biggest human event of the world.” Considering the scale of the production, this is entirely understandable. Now that the votes are almost in, many will sanguinely look forward to a period of relative calm. They will pray that the talking heads on television, Arnab’s selfrighteous homilies, and the outpourings by many in the intelligentsia will give way to a saner, more constructive discourse of the kind that the founders of Constitution would have preferred. While moving the draft of India’s Constitution in 1948, Dr BR Ambedkar had remarked: “Constitutional morality is not a natural sentiment. It has to be cultivated… Our people have yet to learn it. Democracy in India is only a top dressing on an Indian soil, which is essentially undemocratic.” Over six decades later, one wonders whether our political discourse has improved over the years, or whether public life continues to be shaped by petty self-interest, crony capitalism, and sanctimony rather than what matters to those struggling with the gritty realities of life on India’s “soil.”

Reflecting back on how India’s leading political parties wooed the voters these past months, it is clear that they employed every stratagem in the book. Most visibly, they selectively interpreted history to trumpet their plans for the country’s future. Where the Congress showcased a 21st Century welfarist agenda (reminiscent of Indira Gandhi’s populism in the 70s) by trying to appeal to farmers, Adivasis, and minorities, the BJP brought back it’s Ram-Janmabhoomi temple agenda wrapped up in its brand of economic nationalism. The Nehru versus Patel “great man” debate was resurrected. Since the Aam Aadmi Party really does not have a history to speak of, Arvind Kejriwal invoked Mahatma Gandhi’s idea of “swaraj” while attacking other political parties with gusto. All this was expected, and played out as per a script we now know by heart. But in the midst of this electoral din, have we missed something, an issue larger than our elections in continterms of its impact on India’s citizen, indeed the global aam aadmi?

When Indians were voting these past weeks, unexpected hail storms flattened crops in parts of northern, central and western India, dashing the hopes of millions of farmers, driving some to suicide and triggering fears of agrarian distress on a large scale. These storms came less than a year after last year’s floods in Uttarakhand, and continue to this day. Such freak weather events have been increasing over the past decade, causing draughts, snowstorms, and floods in places that had rarely seen them before. Tsunamis, the “polar vortex,” and hurricanes of all shapes and sizes have increased in frequency and intensity in recent times. These sorts of occurrences have not only caused damage where they have unleashed their fury, but have also triggered socioeconomic and political problems that governments are struggling with. One mentions these events to flag a huge lacuna at the heart of India’s political discourse during the recently concluded elections: The virtual absence of any discussion on the environmental challenges facing the country as we hurtle towards an uncertain future. It is extraordinary that not one of India’s major political parties competing for national dominance has said anything consequential on how it will tackle the specter of global warming, and the effects of carbon emissions, water pollution, and environmental degradation. Barely a year after the havoc in Uttarakhand that decimated virtually half of the state, how is it that none of our major leaders, from Narendra Modi to Rahul Gandhi to Arvind Kejriwal has said anything about the impending environmental crisis that confronts India? How is it that even as hailstorms are decimating crops, all that the mainstream political parties can do is debate the sluggishness of India’s procedures for granting environmental clearances to big industrial projects—many of which will go on to pollute the earth while displacing countless communities living on the margins of India’s “growth” story? Should policies of sustainable development not be an integral part of any election manifesto?

As millions of Indian voters were lining-up to cast their votes in April this year, the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), made up of 1,250 environmental scientists and approved by 194 governments, published an assessment on global warming. Their report makes it clear that climate change is real, is impacting the lives of people around the world, and we are doing far too little to mitigate its adverse effects. “We have assessed impacts as they are happening in natural and human systems on all continents and oceans,” said Rajendra Pachauri, the chair of the IPCC, which was jointly established by the U.N. and the World Meteorological Organization. “No one on this planet will be untouched by climate change,” he added.

Where the report acquires great significance is in the way that it links the issue of climate change with countless other socio-economic and political risks that humanity faces. For instance, the IPCC notes that global warming increases the chances of political conflict and is capable of making poor parts of the world (like many parts of India) more impoverished. “Climaterelated hazards constitute an additional burden to people living in poverty, acting as a threat multiplier,” the report’s authors write. Let us not forget that the human suffering in Uttarakhand last year was as much the result of excessive flooding as human mistakes such as indiscriminate construction and bad planning. To its credit, the IPCC’s report is not all doom and gloom. It also contains a number of possible solutions to these problems, but is India’s elected leadership listening? On April 22nd, again in the middle of election season, the world celebrated Earth Day. It should remind us—as earthlings—of our place in the larger world, of our global interconnectedness, and indeed, the fragile balance that sustains life on earth. There may well be a link between China’s air pollution, America’s dependence on oil, and India’s hailstorms. Certainly, the IPCC would like us to think so. As India welcomes a new government, one can only hope that it will function with a sense of perspective, informed not only by the virtues that Dr. Ambedkar associated with the phrase “Constitutional morality,” but also a commitment to what sustains life on the planet as a whole.