Noted environmental activist Ramesh Agrawal, who lobbied with villagers against coal mining projects in Chhattisgarh’s Raigarh district, and had recently won the prestigious Goldman Environment Prize, claimed on Tuesday he is not against industrialisation but environmental laws need to be followed strictly.
Speaking to reporters, 56-year-old Agrawal said the Chhattisgarh Government is not concerned about the environment. “The problems of pollution have become alarming in Chhattisgarh and most of these problems have been created by sponge iron industries,’’ claimed Agrawal. He said the industrial companies made a beeline in Chhattisgarh after 2003-2004.
Agrawal remarked, “Industries are necessary for the development but not at the cost of human lives.”
He further remarked that for setting up industries it was necessary to obtain environment impact assessment report but most of the time such reports found to be false. Investigation should be made on such issues, he said.
On environment issue, he said, “it was most unfortunate that environment has not been given priority in the entire country. Developments are being carried out in blatant violation of all rules and regulations and as a result the people are going to face serious problems in the days to come,” he said.
Citing the example of Jindal power plant in Chhattisgarh, he said all rules have been violated by the company.
Agrawal said he has taken the matter to the Supreme Court. Similarly, the case related to Monnet Ispat is also pending with the Supreme Court since 2007.
The activist said he has been carrying out his struggle to protect the environment with limited resources. As a result there were repeated attempts by industrial houses to murder him. Few months ago some people had fired at him in an attempt to kill him. Agrawal had blamed Jindal company for the incident.
Elaborating about Raigarh his home district, Agrawal said fly ash generated by power plants have piled up in different area.
“Whenever the Government allows somebody to set up a power plant, it should ensure that a cement plant was set up in a nearby area so that the fly ash generated by it were used,’’ Agrawal opined.
Agrawal said developed countries like the USA and Japan are also fighting with the pollution problems but they have started looking for alternative sources of energy.
He said when the coal reserves will get exhausted in 20-25 years the people engaged in this sector will face unemployment. “While on one hand the country will face energy crisis, on the other it will have the problems of unemployment. It was time for scientists and experts to think on this,” Agrawal said.