[Reader-list] Urgent action called for - pl call / write to authorities - Teesta Floods

[Nagraj Adve]

Friends,

*Urgent action is called for, as the met department is forecasting heavy
rains in Darjeeling and Jalpaiguri districts (as well as in most of Sikkim)
for 19th & 20th July.*
*On already rain-soaked, weak hill slopes, this might aggarvate disastrous
sitiuations, adding more water to already swollen rivers. *
*
*
*Pl call the following 'authorities' to take immdt actions - as** soon as
possible, and pl do call as many of them as possible. *
*
*
*Indiaclimatejustice collective*
*------------------------------------------------ *
URGENT LETTER

TO:

1. Principal Secretary,Gorkha Territorial Administration, Darjeeling
R D Meena
*0354-2254918 (O), 0354-2254711 (Fax)*

2. District Magisrate, Darjeeling
Dr. Saumitra Mohan, IAS
*0354-2254233/2256201(O), 0354-2256182(R), 0354-2254338(Fax)*
*E-Mail: dm-darj at nic.in<http://f5mail.rediff.com/ajaxprism/@mail/mailto:%3Ca%20href=>
*" target='_blank' rel=external>dm-darj at nic.in

3. Sub-Divisional Officer, Siliguri
Shri Rachna Bhagat,IAS
*0353-2529021 (O), 0353-2529022 (R), 0353-2430444 (Fax)*
*E-mail: sdo.siliguri at gmail.com*" target="_blank" href="@mail/mailto:
slg-sdo at nic.in,sdo.siliguri at gmail.com" target='_blank' rel=external>
slg-sdo at nic.in,sdo.siliguri at gmail.com

4. Sub-Divisional Officer, Kalimpong
Shri. Lakpa Narbu Sherpa, WBCS (Exe)
*03552-255264 (O), 03552-254265 (R), 03552-255280 (Fax), Mobile. 9609849335*
*E-mail: sdo_kalimpong at nic.in*');" >sdo_kalimpong at nic.in

5. To Smt Jayanti Natarajan,
Union Minister of State of Environment and Forests (IC), Paryavaran Bhawan,
New Delhi 110001 Email:*jayanthi.n at sansad.nic.in');" >
jayanthi.n at sansad.nic.in*

6. To Shri Jyotiraditya Scindia,
Union Minister of State of Power (IC), Shramshakti Bhawan, Rafi Marg,
Parliament Street, New Delhi 110001 Email: *scindia1 at gmail.com*');" >
scindia1 at gmail.com

7. Shri M Shashidhar Reddy
Vice Chairperson, National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA), NDMA
Bhawan,
A-1, Safdarjung Enclave, New Delhi - 110029
Email: *vc at ndma.gov.in*<http://f5mail.rediff.com/ajaxprism/@mail/mailto:%3Ca%20href=>"
target='_blank' rel=external>vc at ndma.gov.in
* *
*
*
*
*
*Respected Sirs and Madam,*
* *
*Sub: Please act urgently to prevent a disaster in waiting in the
Darjeeling Hills*

As the country is yet to come to terms with the scale of disaster in
Uttarakhand and the damage to lives and property, many more disasters are
in waiting to be triggered off by projects that have been taken up without
considering the vulnerability, risks, impacts or even their viability and
desirability.
A similar disaster of an enormous scale can strike any of the ecologically
fragile mountainous regions of Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Sikkim,
Darjeeling Hills of W Bengal, Arunachal Pradesh and other North East
states, where unbridled projects violating all laws and regulations of the
country is being allowed by successive local administration, governments
and the ministry of environment and forests succumbing to the coercion of
the corporate dam building lobby, tourist and hotel operators and the road
and transport agencies.
While Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh
still appear in the radar due to controversial hydro power projects,
assertive peoples struggles and devastating floods and earthquakes, the
condition of Darjeeling Hills washed by the mighty Teesta and scarred by
two hydro power projects constructed by the NHPC within a distance of only
30 kms has gone un-noticed and un-reported. 1st stage (TOR) clearance (see:
http://environmentclearance.nic.in/Auth/openletter.aspx?TOR=3241) for the
144 MW Teesta Intermediate Project of W Bengal State Electricity
Distribution Compnay with 19 m high dam just downstream of confluence of
Rangit and Teesta River at Teesta Bazar was given by the MoEF in July 2009.
A fourth hydro project TLDP V is proposed (by W Bengal State Electricity
Distribution Company Ltd, the project was recommended approval for Terms of
Reference by the Expert Appraisal Com of MoEF in May 2013, disregarding the
letter from SANDRP on Apr 27, 2013 that required information for the
project as per CIC order is not available in public domain) just downstream
from TLDP IV. Just downstream from TLDP V is the Teesta Barrage. All these
projects are just downstream of the massive hydropower development ongoing
in upstream Sikkim (see map:http://sandrp.in/basin_maps/Teesta%20150411.jpg)
.
*People in Teesta area under threat: (from an Action Alert from NESPON in
July 2013) *National Highway 31 A--and adjoining areas in the Teesta basin
in Sikkim and North Bengal--is under threat, due to recent heavy rainfall
in the Darjeeling hills. TLDP III and IV fall within a 20 km stretch in the
river Teesta up to Teesta Bazar, starting from Sevok Bazaar, Kalijhora and
27th Mile, both the TLDP sites fall in this area. Thousands of people
reside in the roadside villages of this area, many of which are forest
villages. 29th mile is such a forest village near 27th mile dam site. NHPC
had earlier constructed a so-called ‘guard wall’ to protect the village,
which broke at several places within last 1 week, letting the rising dam
water come directly to unguarded and fragile slopes which have a tendency
to cave in as soon as there is a moderately heavy rainfall.  People living
here are scared and spending sleepless nights. Frequent landslides in this
area are adding to the problem. This monsoon of July 2013, the villages
Gayelkhola, 29th mile, 27th mile, Rombhi and Riyang are under threat. NHPC
personnel asked the villagers to evacuate and they promised to pay rupees
two thousand (Rs 2000 only) to each of the 15 families living near the
river only for 4 months as house rent. It needs to be mentioned that
at 29th Mile
alone there are 70+ families, all of whom live in danger: continuous and
heavy rains can swallow the whole area within a few moments.  The
administrative is unresponsive, the political parties are apathetic; nobody
is talking about rehabilitation and any permanent solution.
At present, the villagers are too scared of politicians and NHPC musclemen
to talk about their problem publicly. Very recently an officer from the SDO
Office of Kalimpong came to the village and threatened them with eviction
because they are occupying GREF (defense) land. 29th Mile is a forest
village and people there had already filed claims under forest Rights Act.
The idea evidently is to clear the area before it goes to the river, and
without paying any compensation.
We have seen photographs of 29th Mile, Teesta Reservoir and the breach in
the guard wall. A couple of photographs also show new landslides at
Kalijhora, TLDP-IV site. The photographs were taken on 2 July by a
fact-finding team of NESPON.
*The Run-of-the-River projects with huge impoundments! *The so called low
dam projects TLDP III and IV (the name of low dams given is clearly
misleading, since both are large dams as per international definition, with
height of TLDP III dam being 32.5 m high and that of TLDP IV dam being 45
m) are constructed within 18 kms of each other with reservoirs extending to
8 kms and 7 kms respectively. Teesta is no longer flowing in an
approximately 15 km long stretch along NH 31A. More than 400 families in
three forest villages living in the gorge, mostly uncompensated and
ignored, now await submergence of their homes, wayside shops that provided
them livelihood and whatever little cultivated land they had.**
TLDP-III and IV were accorded environmental clearance by the MoEF in 2003
and 2005 amidst protest by the local population, environmental groups as
well as hydrologists, geologists and biologists from North Bengal and all
over the country citing shoddy, inadequate and meager compensation and
fraudulent EIAs that were incomplete, non-transparent, and
non-participatory. The EIAs either contained inadequate data on possible
environmental impacts or deliberately suppressed and falsified important
scientific data on those impacts. The MoEF seems to be going down the same
path in case of 144 MW Teesta Intermediate Project and 80 MW TLDP V now.
The Geological Survey of India (GSI) Report on the projects indicated that
construction activity and damming the river might not only re-activate
dormant slides in the area, but also open new slides. The report also
mentioned that neo-tectonic movements are very common for such a juvenile
organic belt like Himalayas and the Main Boundary Thrust (M.B.T) passes
very close to the TLDHP-IV dam axis which is non-tectonically active’. As a
public warning, the GSI, Kolkata office had also erected a display board
near the TLDP IV site showing the tectonic slides around the site which was
taken down by the NHPC later on.
The EIA was based on data collected from a study area that extended to only
7 Kilometers upstream from the project site. Hydrological data given in the
DPR and EIA did not take into account the possible increase of discharge
and ensuing floods caused by glacial melting in the upstream. These
omissions posed serious questions to the credibility of all the
hydrological computations used in the DPR and the EIA.**
Dynamite was used rampantly  at TLDP-III sites, and the slopes on both
banks of the river—along NH 31A near 27thMile, and Nazeok forest
village—were entirely denuded of existing vegetation cover. At TLDP-IV site
at Kalijhora, slopes on the left bank (downstream) were similarly affected.
No slope protection activity at the dam sites, (and along the reservoir
rims, and potential slide zones) was undertaken, not until NH 31A caved in
August 2006 just above the TLDP-III site at 27th Mile.
During the flood of 2007, a swollen and angry Teesta tore through the
paltry embankments, and came back to its original channels at both TLDP-III
and IV sites, submerging the entire worksites at both places. Heavy
dredgers and makeshift construction workers’ shanties were swept away
alike, and workers had to be rescued at Kalijhora.
At least 14 new landslides, big and small, opened up between Kalijhora and
29th Mile, on both banks of Teesta with new sinking zones opening up on the
NH 31A. The new road that NHPC built to TLDP-III site is caving in
repeatedly. Lateral cracks could be seen in the sandy soil of the entire
slope. No slope protection work is visible along the road.  All old slides
have worsened and more slides have opened up on NH 31A since the disastrous
earthquake in Sikkim and sub-Himalayan North Bengal on September 18, 2011.
The Darjeeling hills is also in Seismic Zone IV.
While 29th Mile and Geilkhola roadside forest villages are shown as project
affected villages, Karmatt is a forest village now facing destruction by
impending landslides aggravated by TLDP-IV construction work just below the
village. The 29th Mile, Geilkhola and the Ryiang villages face certain
displacement.  In a surprising development, the GREF under the Ministry of
Defence has begun constructing a re-aligned road from the TLDP-III site at
27th Mile to Teesta Bazaar.
*Violation of Forest Rights Act *In early 2012*, *The Gramsabha of 29th mile
Forest Village has passed resolutions to the effect that the dam-building
activities by NHPC in the 27th Mile TLDP Stage-III are in direct violation
of the Forest Rights Act: “it impinges upon our constitutional rights to
live, cultivate and otherwise use the forest land in which we have been
living for nearly a century now”, the Resolution says, “NHPC activities
pose a direct threat to our village in total violation of the project
holder’s commitments as expressed in the EIA and the EMP for the project:
while both documents mentioned that only the low-lying river bed areas of
our village would be affected, the project in fact affects the entire
village at present. We find that the water level in the TLDP-III reservoir
will reach the present level of NH 31A and beyond, hence putting our
village in great danger of submergence, soil erosion and fresh landslides.
... the re-alignment of the NH 31A has been affecting our village both
ecologically and economically—the road construction has been affecting
forests under our Gram Sabha—forest trees had been illegally felled without
first seeking and obtaining any permission by the Gram Sabha, and thus the
forest clearance for this has apparently been obtained under false
premises. The re-alignment will also destroy our livelihoods as the present
NH 31A is our economic lifeline.”
*What can be done? *While NHPC has used coercion, dolling out contracts and
money to keep the local population under control, it has also continued
with the construction of the dams without any hindrance from any authority.
It seems that the MoEF has washed its hands off, with no review of its
compliance conditions and periodic monitoring. A review of the MoEF website
shows that the site carries no Compliance Report (CR) for TLDP III and the
latest CR of TLDP IV is for January 2012. It may be noted that as per EIA
notification of Sept 2006, submission of CR every six months and putting
the same in public domain are mandatory, but these norms are clearly
getting violated. Similarly there are no monitoring reports for either of
the projects.
There is also no cumulative impact assessment report for the W Bengal
portion of the Teesta basin, which should include the cumulative impacts of
TLDP III, TLDP IV, Teesta barrage (all existing or under construction) and
Teesta Intermediate and TLDP V (both proposed, TOR clearance given or
recommended).
The fate of the local population, the ecology of the area and the all
important NH 31A now solely rests on the local administration embedded in
the Gorkhaland Territorial Authority. The condition is fast deteriorating
and needs immediate attention.
*We demand:*
A. Complete land-for-land rehabilitation in suitable locations and adequate
cash compensation for all the bonafide residents of Geilkhola, 29th Mile,
Riang, Karmatt and all others affected including those affected by
landslide from NHPC and the Government of West Bengal.
B. No further construction work in any project sites till NHPC adequately
complies with the EMP for TLDP-III and IV, particularly at TLDP-III, in
accordance with the Forest Rights Act, 2006.
C.  Adequate and proper restoration of the NH 31A by NHPC. NHPC must ensure
rim-protection measures, and watershed conservation work as detailed in the
EMPs.
D. Disaster risk assessment of the area in view of various vulnerabilities
of the area including landslides, flashfloods, earthquakes, dam break in
Sikkim and others.
E. Cumulative Impact Assessment of impacts of all the existing projects,
including carrying capacity. It should be kept in mind that the Mahananda
wildlife sanctuary is less than 10 km from the area and area is also
elephant corridor.
F. In any case, Teesta Intermediate and TLDP V should not even be
considered at this stage.
G. Ask NHPC to stop work on the projects since they have not submitted the
CR as required under law.
H. Enquire into the violations and coercive measures used by various
authorities by a independent credible committee.

We will look forward to your urgent action /response.

Yours Sincerely,