OutpostThe Environmental

Pupentry - The artform revived and used for a global cause p 12

Bogus propositions: The Chennai corporation p 4

Check this out - Rooftop Gardening p 7

A Blessing in disguise p 13Agriculture techniques

DEPARTMENT OF JOURNALISM, MADRAS CHRISTIAN COLLEGE

ISSUE NO. 001| VOLUME NO. 002| OCTOBER 4, 2010 16 PAGES| *FOR PRIVATE CIRCULATION ONLY| CHENNAI

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“Tree walks” : A Green initiative by Nizhal

It was astonishing to find so many varieties of trees in the decades old cathedral campus; I personally

believed that cathedrals were merely places of worship, but now my whole understanding of things have changed, I find them to posses a separate ecolo-gy of its own” says Latha Arogyaraj, a believer who visits the cathedral very often.Nizhal, a Non Governmental Organisa-tion (NGO) that promotes tree culture organised a Tree Walk at st. Georges Cathedral, Anna Salai. The crowd gathered was diverse, ranging from tiny tots to grandpas and grandmas and splashed over with a group of over enthusiastic students. The uno-motu reason behind this gathering was to simply learn more about trees and find out on how we too can play a part in protecting trees and the whole green environment.Dr A.E. Dulip Daniel, professor of Botany, Scott Christian College Chen-nai, guided the group pointing out the unique features of each every tree in the park. As this pack of tree huggers moved from tree to tree, the curious on lookers too joined the group to sharpen their intelligence quotient regarding their environment. “Earlier there were

lots of varieties of trees in this Cathe-dral but now we can’t find any of those here” says Samantha, a proud member of the NGO. First of all we are plan-ning to grow big Nagalinga, Neem, Banyan, Sappota trees, Gulmohar, va-rieties of Peepul, Acacia, and Pungai in and around the campus. By doing so the campus would look much greener and immaculate, which will automati-cally render the people with a fresh mind when they come into the church”, says Shobha Menon, one of the found-ers of NIZHAL.Students from Madras Christian Col-lege (MCC) were also there for the walk and showed interest in know-ing more about the varieties of trees. “The objectives of NIZHAL are to promote more ecological tours, trek-king trips, and tree walks. Purpose of ecological tour and trekking trips helps to understand people who even don’t know how the planet EARTH is badly affected by Global Warming and Cli-mate Change. “In order to keep these changes to be balanced we need more and more awareness in the field of tree walk, ecological tours and trekking trips instead of sign-board campaigns”, says Ambika, a member of NIZHAL.Many school students took great inter-

est in knowing more about the trees and even were able to share some use-ful information they knew of. For Ni-zhal, the next event up on the boards is an eco friendly walk at the Women’s Christian college campus and is all set to draw in curious environmentalists into the foray. So keep your eco-kits ready and horn your environmental skills and set sail on a journey in har-mony with Nature.

An amazed crowd Photo: AmarjitA walk conducted by Nizhal

Amarjit Sharma

Amarjit Sharma

Cricket - A chapter re-written by climate change

Hoowzaaaaaaat! And there goes another six! It is rain-ing sixes!’ All these have turned into clichés in recent

years. The world of cricket has seen a series of unparalleled changes, be it the change in the format, the usage of bats, the unusual power packed performances of the cricketers etc. yet all these owe up to one single global occurrence which till now has been a term unused, unstated, unheard of in the annals of cricket history i.e.’ the climate change’.Climate change has struck the world of cricket and it certainly has struck hard. The Phenomenon has both played a spoil sport and a key player in fostering the game. Cricket analyst and a member of the executive committee of the Tamil Nadu Cricket Association, Mr. Adam Sait say’s that “the sudden gear shift in the global climate scene and soaring temperatures have clearly curtailed the stamina of the cricketers. The 21st generation cricketers have to face the wrath of the bowlers and the climate change as well.” The cricketers today often get drained out at the end of a fifty over long innings due to which the game becomes all lethargic and predictable for most of the parts. The concep-tion of the 20-20 format of the game was more or less a side affect of this issue and was also a major effort to increase the adrenaline rush and the X factor of the game. “The game of Cricket has not remained the same, it has slowly mutated from a day long, expectable, well structured game to one totally unanticipated, obscure and absurd” says Mr. T. Chan-drasekaran, District Sports Officer, Sports Development Authority of Tamil Nadu (SDAT). Considering the pros and cons of the impact of climate change on the game, one does

observe the fact that it has literally balanced the scale. “Sci-entifically, the elevated temperatures did help the game in a great way. The number of sixes thrashed over the stadium in a cricket season has increased two fold in recent years. The reason being not the grid iron hands and pumping iron body’s alone but also the simple fact that warmer air is less dense and allows the balls to travel a few meters further than usual” says Akshay Dinesh, an ardent cricket fan and an En-

gineering student specializing in physics at Amrita College Of Engineering, Coimbatore.Another startling impact of the climatic variations has been the ban on the usage of Methyl bromide which is supposedly believed to be harmful and could contribute to the ozone layer depletion, the very same methyl bromide which is used to treat the willow (wood), of which 90% of the interna-tional cricket bats are made. “If this persists, there won’t

be any more cricket bats left in the forthcoming years” says Mr. P. Giri Thara, a whole sale cricket equipment dealer and also a leading exporter of cricket bats in Chennai.Soon the cricketing world will have to be face lifted off vari-ous basic rules and regulations to make it adaptable to the need of the hour and also to keep up the spirit of the game in a more eco-friendly way. When peeving into the future one may find bats and balls being made from a more eco friendly material than wood to prevent global warming. But all said and done whatever is being done is with the sole aim of the betterment of humanity and if such a situation comes that the game has to be stopped being played then the uno-motu answer that any one would come out with spontaneously is just that, ‘the game has to go on’.

India is a country which is built up of different climatic zones. Each of

these zones consists of various ecolo-gies which are further disintegrated into numerous varieties of flora and fauna. All of these are now at stake due to the global phenomenon of climate change.Our country is totally different from other countries of the world. Since our country is a developing country, we depend mostly on agriculture. Earlier there were no such problems, the time-ly coming of monsoon rains helped greatly in supplying water to the ag-ricultural fields. Being an agricultural country we depend on monsoon rains for irrigation. As the temperature keeps on rising there are changes in the eco-logical balance of the country. The un-timely coming of monsoon has stirred up great floods and has destroyed both life and property whereas there are other parts of the country which are undergoing droughts and famines due to the unpredictable monsoon season; this phenomenally affects the agricul-tural productivity of the country.Due to continuous deforestation by people the temperature goes on increas-ing day by day. “Rising temperature is not a phenomenon thatonly affects our country but also the whole world. “The Antarctic and Arctic icebergs melt due to rise in temperature and the water levels of the ocean becomes higher and higher day by day”, says Mr Arun R Nagarajan, Proprietor. Sources say that their agricultural land is in a mess due to frequent floods and droughts occurring every year. “Last year in December due to erratic rains most of the agricultural fields were flooded, in spite of using the high yielding variety seeds, we could not harvest the cereals that we had expected to produce, we suffered a serious economic problem ”, says Srinivas, a farmer from Kanchi-puram district, Tamil Nadu. As far as the north east is concerned, especially in Manipur, all the hills look distictively like a man without a single strand of hair on his head, due to con-tinuous deforestation by the people liv-ing near the hilly regions. Dr. Rajan, Director of the Central Agriculture University, Manipur says “The tem-perature along the north eastern line of the country has been rising unimagin-ably as compared to the last years re-port. Most of the agricultural lands are flooded due to which our economy has also been very badly affected”.To be more eco-friendly and more en-vironmentally conscious, we should educate ourselves on how to ably handle rising issues of concern and equip ourselves to face the impact of the deteriorating condition of the earth. When one becomes socially aware he gains self awareness by default.At the end of the day it all zeroes in on us, we humans decide our future, and once we decide there is no other force in this whole wide world that could make us back out on it.

Where is the Green vegetation ?

Robin Babu

From the lines: Taking a quick breather Photo: Amarjit

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Robin Babu

Precipitation - Vital for sustainable agriculture

New age “Eco-Polymer” technology - A boon to tackle global warming

The Indian Panorama of climate change has been one crammed with interchanging crests and

troughs of copious events till date, be-ing highly dependent on agriculture; India has to face the brunt of climate change at a much elevated scale than other non-agro countries.The differ-ent elements of climate change i.e. the rise in temperatures, abridged rainfall, melting of glaciers, Increase in concen-tration of the green house gases, Deple-tion of the ozone hole; have all affected the Indian system collectively, but the rate and type of impact of each of these elements has been varying and in some cases highly contrasting. One such fac-tor which has had a radical effect on the agricultural practices in India has been ‘Precipitation or rainfall’.Indian agriculture has been predomi-nantly dependent on rains as the sole deciding factor for its sustenance. “Nearly 80 million hectares out of the country’s total net-sown area lack ir-rigational facilities and solely depend on rains for the crop growth” say’s Mr. Arun Nagarajan, an environmen-talist specializing in Agriculture. The whole agricultural scenario of India has changed now, as with the onset of the cataclysmic occurrence of cli-mate change all the innate ecological processes have either been accelerated or decelerated which has brought on a sudden shift onto the usual procession of natural processes.Due to climatic variations, the pre-cipitation patterns in our country are highly unpredictable and random i.e. the annual rate of rainfall in areas of higher altitude are on the rise where as the graph attains an all time low when subtropical land areas are concerned. “Climate change and Global warming have affected the hydrological cycle viz. precipitation, transpiration and

soil moisture and has further posed new challenges on the field of agri-culture” say’s Dr. I. Zareena Begum, Assistant Professor at Madras School Of Economics and a Specialist in En-vironmental Science. Expressing the same concern Dr.Sudip Mitra, Project Director, M.S.Swaminathan Research Foundation (MSSRF) added “Due to these unstable climatic conditions the farmers lose track of the right season to sow there seeds in and ultimately end up with a non-profitable yield which forces them onto un-payable debts and ultimately on committing suicides”.Furthermore, due to the uneven pre-cipitation in different regions include soil erosion, growth of harmful fungi

(in exceedingly wet conditions),food shortages during change of seasons as the crops are yet to mature, reduction in soil nutrients, flash floods etc. These consequences fabricate further prob-lems that lead onto loss of life, damage of property, unemployment, poverty, so on and so forth. “It is more important to observe and ac-cess short term changes in climate pat-terns and the larger problem of climate change will take care of itself” says Dr. A.A. Nambi, Project Director, Climate-change, MSSRF. Stating the possible solutions to this issue Dr.S.Kannaiyan, an environmentalist and a reformist says, “Imparting of proper knowledge to farmers and other stake holders on

the issue of climate change, simple ad-aptations like change in planting dates and usage of better crop varieties re-sistant to both exceptionally wet and harshly dry conditions and also better understanding of the soil, atmosphere and other environmental facets of their region”. Farmers, if take up such sim-ple but effective measures, they could easily tackle the harsh climatic con-ditions and could reap a fine harvest. Their knowledge on the issue acqiured through various means will be the most effective device in the road for ultimate survival. Rain or no rain, as the old saying goes, “when the going gets tough, the tough definitely find ways to get going”

Unpredictable Rains: A farmer fishing in a field flooded by torrential rains in chengalpet district Photo: Robin Babu

A Bizarre thought but a novel idea, these are the only words that aptly define the whole concept

of the new age Eco-Polymer technology, which ac-cording to scientists could help in resolving the vital problem of ice and glacier melting.The melting of polar caps has been an issue of ris-ing concern to nations all around the world. Ice is a highly reflective material, turning away 70-90 per-centage of the total solar radiations that reach the sur-face of the earth, but due to their gradual degradation the process of reflection now has been turned over to water which has a reflection rate of only 7-12 per-centage, indirectly furthering melting. Commenting on the issue, Sunil.C. Menon, an envi-ronmental studies student at government engineer-ing college Trichur said, “Large areas of the Arctic ice are unstable. In areas where super-chilled water mixes with ice pieces ranging from a few millimeters to a meter in size, the waves and currents of the water prevent the pieces from aggregating into larger ice platforms further contributing to the whole issue”. Another issue is the leaching of tones and gallons

of fresh water into the ocean, which leads to conse-quences ranging from an annual rise in the sea level by 2 mm to creation of colossal tropical storms and hurricanes. This new technology involves the covering up of ice caps and glaciers with a semi porous polymer, which would help in reflection of sun light or infrared rays and enhance the phenomenon of freezing. The poly-mer would aid calm the local waters and have an im-proved reflectivity than open water. In each polymer raft as it is commonly known, capillary forces would accumulate the water through the cavities and would endow with a chance of freezing, providing the foun-dation for the growth of a large ice structure. In common mans words the polymer would prevent melting and enhance freezing. “The idea is phenom-enal but only a partial solution to the issue,” says Dr. Anita .G. Mary, a marine biologist.The practicality of the whole experiment is the sole issue of concern as shipping in, these sheets through aeroplane and then transporting them inland using other modes of transportation like sambuks and other

fright vehicles incurs heavy expenses and difficul-ties. The polymer sheets of the most minimal size are several meters long, very thin and highly sensitive. “Another major concern being that the amount of pollution that is stirred up in materializing this ex-periment is far more severe and devastating in com-parison to the purpose that it actually serves,” said Dr. K. Easwaran, a scientist and an environmental educationist.In all the eco polymer technology is one of its kind with no alternatives or replacements, adding up all its pros and cons, the conclusions that have been drawn state that incurring heavy expenses to find out solu-tions for the aftermath of an issue is meaningless, as if the parent phenomenon is unraveled, by default all its implications will be sorted out too. The chapter of a great deluge has escaped the knowl-edge of no single human mind but what assurance do we have that history would not repeat itself. Science has made an unimaginable progress in both annihilat-ing and rejuvenating planet earth but ‘at what cost’, a question that still lingers in our minds.

A Eco-Friendly polymer that prevents ice and glacier meltingRobin Babu

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‘Promises’- simple to make, hard to keep

Pollutionem’ (a Late Latin term for pollution), has always re-mained an irresolvable, incon-

clusive and a noxious impediment for the Chennai corporation’s ‘Clean and Green’ city initiative. Baffling the brightest of human minds bent on find-ing out elucidations for the issue, it re-mained as the numero-uno stumbling block en-route to overall excellence.A phenomenon, seeping in at a rate even faster than at which it was be-ing rooted out; pollution poses a grave threat to the general progression and development of the city. Understanding the shortcomings and the discrepancies in the system, the city corporation has tabled out various new techniques and strategies to handle the rising issue, but all said and done are all these new schemes and aids scripted out solely for the records and public speeches or are they really meant for materializa-tion?, a unified question that still re-mains ‘unanswered’.The Chennai city corporation is an amalgamated body that works round the clock with a modus operandi of es-tablishing Chennai as an exemplar city both in structural design and function-ality. Being a pioneer in the field, the corporation has initiated copious proj-ects for the environmental, societal, structural and functional betterment of the city but after a certain extent of progression most of these projects have been put on a stand still, languish-ing billions of rupees on the line. “The corporation in the past five years has invested profoundly in a line of proj-ects most of which are not visible to the naked human eye” says Dr. C. Thomas Jacob, senior program officer, Environ-mental Information System (ENVIS). The corporation in its Environment and forest department’s policy note (2003-04) had mentioned about the initialization of various environment based strategies and initiatives such as the Air quality monitoring system, Vehicle emission monitoring system, Water quality management, Hazard-ous substance management, Munici-pal solid waste management, Plastics waste management and Biomedical waste management. It also proposed the setting up of environmental train-ing institutes, applied research and

development wings in various NGO’s and other non profit organizations.“Most of these projects, in letter as well as those still in the earlier stages of conceptualization are all in a way incongruent and non functional, even though numerous such schemes do ex-ist till date, they mean no more than an Intel quad processor at the hands of a two year old kid” says N. Prasad, a So-cial worker and an environmentalist. Furthermore, Dr. P. Nammalwar, an urban environmental conservation-ist says, “The automobile emission monitoring system that was initiated by the Chennai city corporation in the year 1984 and reinstated in the year 1998 was a key success in the eyes of the corporation in meting out with the problem of air pollution but the core reality was that that even now illegal sales of polluted and adulterated oils including petrol and diesel are on a high and vehicles which have crossed the permissible age of functioning still run rampant on roads contributing

heavily to the cataclysmic air pollution rate of the city”. ¬Another fine example of the bogus propositions made by the corporation is the solid waste management scheme that was introduced in May 2003. The highlights of the whole agenda includ-ed door to door collection of waste, collection of garbage on a daily basis, separate dumping and processing of Bio-degradable and non bio degrad-able wastes, setting up of new transfer stations and new dumping yards out-side city limits. Out of the unending bulletins posted the only few that saw the light of reality consisted of the set-ting up of new dumping yards, transfer stations and the inclusion of several fleets of heavy vehicles/garbage col-lecting trucks. Expressing concern on the inability and dithering mentality of the corporation, T. Anbazhagan, head of a local self help group in Ambathur, Chennai says, “The solid waste man-agement scheme was a major collapse and proved futile and expensive. Nei-

ther was there any door to door collec-tion of garbage, nor was there a timely routine for collecting waste and even if they somehow managed to do it on time, the garbage probably would end up in open areas in the locality like lakes, or porompoke areas( waste lands)”.“Even the Tamil Nadu Pollu-tion Control Board (TNPCB), the au-thority on the issue has got no say in it as according to them their judiciary is limited to only setting up of projects and sketching out the required R&D, they don’t give a damn about whether or not the projects are completed” echo the residents of Kotturpuram, and Peri-ya Kuppam.In a nut shell, the city corporations ‘clean and green’ city drive has proved to be a big hand at poker for the au-thorities and another one of the slump-ing projects for the citizens, which has gulped down billions and produced end products worth pennies.n all, the corporation ‘has miles to go and an un-ending line of promises to keep’.

Courtesy: www.chennaicorporation.gov.in Infographics: Robin Babu

Robin Babu

Winter sports have become the most important source of income for many alpine areas. The

total expenditure incurred on the sports played sea-sonally especially the ones played in winter is really high making it an expensive extravaganza.The term winter sports immediately brings to mind events like skiing, sledging, Skiing is the important sport event played during winter. This particular game is now on the verge of extinction due to non-availability of ice and snow in the alpine areas after the global warming took place. Some areas are sensi-tive to climate change and mountains are most spe-cially one among them.However because of global warming, the ice and the snow are melting and this

might be more threatening to all snow sports such as snow boarding and cross country skiing. But ad-ditionally the ski tourism industry will climb up the mountains to reach snow reliable areas. This process will lead us to a concentration of winter sport activi-ties, and will further pressurize the sensitive environ-ment of the mountains.Clearly it is seen that the climate is only one of many factors influencing snow sports. Moreover less snow threatens the tourism in hilly areas. Mr. Narender, secretary of sports, said that “Mountain without snow is like summer without sea”. There is a major key role played by the weather condition.These are various countries which undertake the climate impact

research on winter sports. When the climate change occured, all the studies show the severe implications that would churn out for the winter sport industry. The financial need of winter tourism industry totally depends on the sufficient snow conditions, which has really come down due to the global warming. However the most important link at present between climate change and mountain tourism is the situation of less snow and as a consequence less earnings in ski tourism. If all other influencing factors remains the same, snow related sports would concentrate and flourish in the high altitude areas that are snow reliable in the future too.

A Chapter deficit of “snow” and “show” - Winter sports Aparna Sai

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Sudden appraisal of “Doomsday movies”

It is early in the evening, a kid is playing ball out in the court yard when suddenly the sky turns dark

and clouded, when the kid looks up anticipating a cold and thunderous shower, to his utter dismay he finds a Biiggg spaceship covering…. The…. Reddish…..Blue…. Expanse…. of the Sky”. Genetically mutated gigantic lizards attacking cities, aliens pouring down from the sky in flying saucers, the earth revisiting a nerve chilling frozen ice age and the re-embodiment of the chapter of an immense deluge; Who in the blue blazes would have the nerve to imagine that some day these scenes from various doomsday movies would materialize into reality, But then what is it that keeps the viewer and the film maker chasing behind such thoughts and ideologies, in both awe and admi-ration?Film makers for ages have been exper-imenting with various different story lines to attain that crucial link with the viewer that determines a stupen-dous success. “Continuous attempts have proved that what the director pro-vides is not the deciding factor but it is what the viewer wants or what he sees in the movie that decides it’s over all success” says Pradeep Kumar, a film analyst and a movie buff. Keeping this very important rule in mind and observing the status reports of various movies that have came out in the past, we find that movies that promulgated the indigenous idea of ultimate world destruction has never failed to make

the cash counters ring. “History clearly reveals that all the doomsday movies have been sticklers for winning” says Mugil Chandran, film critic and faculty at Prasad film academy, Chennai.Recent movies like ‘The day after to-morrow’, ‘The Day the earth stood still’, ‘Armageddon’, ‘2012’, docu-mentaries like ‘zeitgeist addendum’, ‘six degrees could change the world’, ‘The Inconvenient truth’ etc. have been constant reminders of how such mov-ies work wonders at the box office. The instigating factor behind this endless success is still incognito and has had critics and film makers pondering over it for decades now.“The only solution that the intellects of the film fraternity have been able to come up with so far is the rising awareness of the public regarding the issues of global warming” says Shek-har Dattari, wildlife film maker and a film critic. He further adds by saying that “The other common plausibility’s include man’s affinity towards cruelty and de-struction, his eagerness to revisit the chapters of past which speaks of the ice age, the great deluge etc”.Global warming has been a key issue in propelling this bizarre idea among the film fraternity as this phenomenon has been one whose impact is being slowly but gradually seen all around us, people who belong to all the different facets of the society are learning the effects of this phenomenon and are gearing themselves up to face the big picture in the near future. ‘It is this wild spread

awareness and fear that has lead to the sudden appraisal of doomsday movies’ says Shobha Menon, trustee of Nizhal, a non-governemental organization.The only glitch that these movies pos-se is that they are literally engineered to cater to the masses and are all biff, bang and boom. They tend to don a negative superficial mask and provide solely the expected adrenaline rush to the viewers. If these movies were more goal oriented and structured on ac-tual facts and figures they could have helped create positive awareness and impart immense knowledge through-entertainment and irradicate the base-less fear that has been deeply incepted in all human minds.

An inconveniant truth Source: InternetFilm poster

Robin Babu

Aparna Sai

Amarjit Sharma

The world of media nowadays has been focussing greatly on the co-

lossal issue of global warming and the recurring chapters of climate change. The industry through all its mediums (radios, television sets, cinema halls, newspapers, magazines, blogs, the internet etc) has played and will play a vital part in creating the requisite awareness regarding such not so easily resolvable issuesDifferent sectors around the world are contributing towards creating aware-ness about global and climate change. Likewise, media industries are also organising some major awareness programmes to inform and educate people all around the world and make the earth a safe and better place to live. Global Warming has emerged as one of the most important environmental issues over to confront humanity. The film media is one of the most effec-tive as well as popular media around the world.The print media plays a sig-nificant role in bringing out such issues through columns and reports published in newspapers, magazines, brochures etc.“The print media plays a vital role in spreading awareness and news of key environmental issues” says Shobha Menon, Founder, Nizhal. She further adds by saying that, “Celebrities too play an excellent role in stirring aware-ness, since they are looked up to as role models and can generate a lot of inter-est by their actions. Through documen-taries like “Zeitgeist”, “The 11th Hour” etc document the cumulative impact of these global phenomenons’s upon the planet’s life system and call for restor-ative action through a reshaping of hu-man activities. Films like “The Day After Tomorrow” is a science fiction film that depicts catastrophic effects of global warming and climate change. The Indian film industry for ages has been aimed at a single goal and that has been none other than mass enter-tainment. “The film industry should go ahead and contribute to combat against global warming and climate change by sensitizing the general public “says Mughil Chandran, a film critic.“ The Manipuri film industry is also going to produce a 30 minute docu-mentary based on the issue of global warming and climate change which is also a part of awareness programme”, Rupachandra Singh Yumnam, Chief Editor, ISTV Network, Manipur added.Media should avoid catering meaning-less wholesome entertainment to the masses and should start illuminating them on such environmental issues. A lot of people are still unaware of how serious these occurrences could turn ought to be in the near future. What they need at such a point of time is nothing but raw facts regarding these issues, it is only raw reality that is go-ing to better equip them and save them ultimately .So, media should help in giving aware-ness campaigns on the issue to better appease the issue of climate change.

Media an effective tool !

Climate change - The global phenomenon

The major problem which the world is facing today is that of climatic

change. The term climate change has been clichéd due to its significance in each and every strata of the society.Even as the record shows, different parts of the world have recorded the warmest climate in the last 10 years. Showing a phenomenol increase of nearly 1 - 2 degree celcius.In In-dia, there are even cases where many people have died due to the sudden change in climate ei-ther directly or indirectly. In some countries when it is summer the temperatures sore extremely high and when it is winter the tempera-tures fall stone dead. This sudden change of climate has brought a sudden change over in the routine life of gazillions all around the world. Due to these climatic changes there are certain other elements of the system which have also been affected. The inflammable prices of fuel oil, grocer-ies, food iteams have put the consumer in a dilemma to choose between health and wealth. Especially during the sum-mer the price of vegetables go so high,

that the people use sayings such as “the prices are touching the sky”. Even after all this hullo-baloo the response seen from nation all around the world is both meagre and half-hearted. Climatic change affects the lives of every single individual and it is one such issue that need to solved by us. It should not be such that, some are

fighting for it eternally while some are going around increasing the alredy deteorating condition of the whole sys-tem. An IIT professor (name not speci-fied) who recently met a climatologist said that “the science is complex but the facts are clear, the world needs to take steps to limit the phenomenal tem-perature rise”.Rich world are more re-sponsible for most of the accumulated

carbon in the atmosphere, their quar-ters of all carbon dioxide emitted since 1850. No the rich country or the poor country but every developed country must commit themselves to reduce its emissions so that within a decade the emmisions will be comparatively less than its 1990’s level.. Here the devel-oping countries and the poorest regions

of the world will have high com-petition towards the contribution to warming.Overcoming climate change will take a triumph of op-timism over pessimism, of vision over short sightedness of what Abraham Lincoln called “the bet-ter angles of our nature”. If we, with such different national and political perspectives can agree

on what must be done then surely our leaders can too. Finally, at last we can just implore them to make the right choice. It is in our hands, humans to decide and to set the stage for our future generations, if we decide wisely and justly we could surely provide or entail our future generations with a better and a greener place to live in.

Even as the statistics show, differ-ent parts of the world have re-corded the warmest climate in the last 10 years. Showing a phe-nomenal increase of nearly 1 - 2 degree celcius

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The effect of greenhouse gas-ses always gets the bad end of the stick due to its association

with global warming. The Infrared ra-diations are one of the major sources for global warming which effects the green house gases badly.As we have studied earlier in our school days, global warming Its about 30 per-cent of the sunlight that beams towards the earth is deflected by the outer at-mosphere and scattered back into the space whereas rest reaches the planet’s surface and is reflected up ward again as a type of slow moving energy. This process was named as infrared radia-tion by the scientist.Global warming which effects in in-crease in concentration of green house gases in agriculture is due to increase in temperature. It is obvious, that rise in temperature does not result good in ag-riculture. All the fields might get dried due to increase in temperature whereas the heat caused by infrared radiation is

absorbed by greenhouse gases such as water vapor, carbon dioxide ozone and methane, which slows its escape from the atmosphere.“It’s the fact that the green house gas-es make up only about one percent of the earth’s atmosphere, they regulate our climate by tropping heat and hold-ing it in a kind of war-air blanket that surrounds the planet. This long phe-nomenon is called as “green house ef-fect”. This was answered by a student of class CII when asked for the causes and problems faced by us due to rise in concentration of green house gases.One more student of same branch, who also said that “the green house effect is an essential environment pre-requisite for life on earth, there really can be too much of a good thing. This problem usually begins when human activities distort and accelerate the natural pro-cess by creating more green house gas-es in the atmosphere. There are many facts that cause the green house gases

and contributes to global warming. One more problem is global warming, because when more people use fos-sil fuel for heat transportation and for many other purpose the level of green house gases contribute to increase.It is obvious as more as farming oc-curs to feed millions of new people, more green house gases enter the at-mosphere and more green house gases means more infrared radiation is held, which gradually increases the tempera-ture of the earth’s surface and which re-sults in agricultures bad condition too. Also many factories produce long last-ing industrial gases that do not occur naturally, yet contributes significantly to the enhanced green house effect and global warming that is currently under a way says the respected climatologist Mr. Ramesh.In all, man does need to understand on the significance of the corelation between science and nature. Once it is demolished there is literally no looking back for man.

Green house gases - Impact on the environmentAparna Sai

“The Indian economy” reshaped by climate change

Climate change and the economy’, are two terms that by and large do not spell out so effortlessly in a lay man’s

thought house. Till now both these terms never comple-mented each other, but now times have changed, India has came to a stage where these two terms mean much more than any legislation or law. Being a developing nation, India is mostly affected by this observable fact, as the country does not posses enough and sound technologies or scientific development to deal with the impact of this unpredicted chapter of climate change. This handicap has battered India profoundly and has pushed it back en-route to Stone Age. The impact of climate change on the different facets or contributing factors of the Indian economy is as follows:1.Agriculture: Agriculture is the single largest entity of the Indian economy and constitutes an average of 20% of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). “The agricultural sector has been affected directly through phenomenons such as improper precipitation patterns, high temperatures, elevated concentrations of green house gases and indirectly through pest or crop disease outbreaks, cases of fire, soil properties etc” says Dr. M.S. Swaminathan, Chairman, M. S. Swami-nathan research foundation(MSSRF). “Studies reveal that a rise in temperature by 1.5 to 3 degree Celsius could lead to a decrease of approximately 10% of the total rice yields of the country “says Mr. Arun Nagara-jan, an Environmentalist specializing in Agriculture. Most of the studies conducted focus on the physical aspect of the impact due to which an overall understanding of the sec-ondary level impact cannot be perceived and the findings remain abstract and inconclusive.2.Forests: The geographical allocation of the forest area in a country is mainly attributed to the climatic conditions of the given area. The brunt of Climate change on forests has churned out weighty implications such as change in the live-lihood of various tribal groups, loss of numerous Flora and Fauna species, deactivation of various small scale as well as major industries.Forests in the different provinces of the Indian continent are affected differently and the degree of impact varies categor-ically in each case. “Studies reveal that the boreal forests when compared to tropical forests face the risk of under-going ecological degradation and extinction and have been labeled as high risk sectors or regions facing immediate threat” says Dr. Kavi Kumar, an environmental economist.

3.Human Health: The quality of human life depends greatly on climate variation. The vulnerability of human health at-tributes itself to several causative factors such as nutrition status, population growth, and health infrastructure. These factors are rather poor in a developing country like India due to which the burden of climate change is much more critical and adverse here.When it comes to human health, analytical data based on various research initiatives prove that the standard of living at present will deteriorate and cases of people affected with cardiac, skin and respiratory diseases will be on the rise. “If the present condition prevails for long there will be numer-ous deaths owing mainly to cardio-respiratory failure” says Divya Chandran, a PhD Research Scholar specializing in Climate and Health at Anna University, Guindy.4.Impact on Natural resources and the ‘Energy crisis’: Natu-ral resources, the primary source or in short the backbone of all industries is undergoing exhaustion in a rapid pace as the requirement has grown and the cycle of replenishment of these sources has died out due to climate transformations.The technological and industrial development revolution-izing our century has led to the sprouting up of numerous industries both large and small, which has further boosted the dog fight on who gets to take the biggest chunk of the ‘natural resources’ bone. “Excessive usage of biomass fuels, fossil fuels and igno-rance of renewable sources like solar, wind, hydro, tidal power is another issue of concern as it is only when such profitable proven technologies are used that we can sustain the usual system of things” says Ariyyudai Nambi, a scien-tist at MSSRF. Overall the picture of the Indian economy is one on unstable grounds and looks bleak when peered into the future. Within the next century all our fossil fuel reservoirs will be drained out and we will be forced to employ alternative renewable power sources.The country is surely going down in the reverse gear, pro-gressing at an unimaginable pace towards overall destruc-tion. Until and unless immediate steps are taken to bring the spilling situation under control the nation is going to be in real turmoil until all the different knots are loosened out. In a nut shell the whole impact of the phenomenon is just 2 things, one the irrepressible dilapidation of the Indian econ-omy and the other the conception of a new field of study ‘Environmental Economics’.

Robin Babu

MegaGreen Factories

Recognized in 2004 by Guin-ness World Records as the

largest green roof in the world, this green roof covers 454,000 square feet (~10.4 acres) atop Ford’s new truck assembly plant. The green roof is a part of a com-prehensive effort to revitalize the historic Ford Rouge Centre com-plex as a model for 21st Century sustainable manufacturing and is a significant component of a site-wide 600-acre stormwater man-agement system. Other design ob-jectives include the establishment of habitat at roof level, reduction in ambient temperatures, and pro-tection of the roof membrane. The roof is key to Ford’s visitor edu-cation program highlighting en-vironmentally beneficial site and

Audi has launched the “Oak For-est CO2 Reservoir” research proj-ect in cooperation with the Bavar-ian State Forestry and University of Munich.The research project will in future be extended to include interna-tional sites offering climatically different conditions. A second trial site of four hectares is already be-ing planted up with over 13,000 English oaks at the location of Au-di’s Hungarian production plant in Györ. This trial site will likewise be managed by the Technical Uni-versity of Munich – in partnership with the University of Sopron. Plans are already underway for additional sites at international Audi locations.

Ford Manufacturing plant Source: Google Images

The audi manufacturing plant

This column is dedicated to all auto-mobile enthusiasts. If you would like to share your views and thoughts on the subject, send them tomegagfactories@gmail.com

Ford Vs Audi

Compiled by: Robin Babu

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Up above the land so high like a garden in the sky : Roof top gardening

My ancestors are farmers, I am a farmer’s son, I love plants, Gardening is my passion”

exclaimed many with happiness. Many people yearn to go back to the days where one could grow, nurture and produce ones own food. Plucking a ripe juicy tomato from its lentils and then savoring it would simply spell heaven for most of the urbanites. Liv-ing amidst lifeless concrete walls and a culture so dismal and monotonous has left the urban gardener deficit of the term gardening. Urban life has its own shortcomings like lack of recreational space, time and energy to dedicate to other things out side the robotic system but it does have technology that spits out solutions to an assortment of cir-cumstances and hassles that one expe-riences in his routine life. The Nume-ro-Uno solution to this unfathomable fondness of city dwellers towards gar-dening is nothing but ‘Terrace or Roof top gardening’.A roof top garden means a garden on the roof or terrace of a building. It is the most cost effective and lucrative form of gardening which in the recent years has developed as a subject of study and also as a key answer to numerous other problems faced by the 21st generation city people.“Building a roof top garden requires very less space, good fertile soil, a well detailed plan and an earnest initiative to institute a green, blossoming and flourishing garden. It is easy to build

and maintain It is easy to build and maintain and can also serve as a sub-stitute kitchen garden for those who wish to relish their own fruitage” say’s Jayaraman, owner and proprietor of R.R Gardens (specializing in Rooftop Gardening).Urban form of gardening due to its new methodologies, techniques, and princi-ples has been able to mark a separate niche of its own. “Roof top gardening has opened doors to various unknown areas of study, it has helped the com-mon gardener to horn his gardening skills as well as to accumulate knowl-edge on various strata’s of gardening

and its impact on social life” say’s S. Anand, Education Officer, WWF-In-dia.Different gardening techniques like Bonsai, Grafting, and Budding are used in Terrace Gardens to limit the growth of the trees to the accessible space as well as to bear fruits at a tender age; this increases the aesthetic sense as well as the productivity of the garden.“Roof top gardens assist in various vi-tal purposes; it helps to curtail soaring temperatures in the surrounding envi-ronment by transpiring and removing the heat absorbed by walls, roads, due to insulation. It also helps in delaying and reducing rain run off and makes

available the rain water to other needs” say’s J. Anushiya a Ph.D research scholar on Climate and Urban Natural Resources at Anna University, Guindy.Roof top Gardening has become so prominent, that now days it has achieved the status of being called a trend more than a crop growing sys-tem. “Posh Hotels and malls have started to incorporate Terrace gardens on a sprawling area of 10,000-20,000 square feet. Terrace gardens have turned into an element of structural de-sign rather than serving the sole pur-pose of a garden” say’s Senthil Kumar, an Architect and the owner of a Private construction company.Living in a Metropolitan and having a garden in our very own home could not have been a leeway till date, but not any more, Roof top gardening not only fulfills the hope of having an exquisite garden in our home but also provides us with the oppurtunity of relishing our own fruitage. When one tastes the fruit, it is not the taste of sweet or sour but the unmentionable taste of bitter hard-work that melts down in our mouth. It remains in our taste buds for time in-definite.Roof top gardening in short is an art that makes us both environment friend-ly and hardworking. It indirectly helps us, in doing our fare share for moth-er nature. So next time when u think about pruning out your gardening skills, space is never going to play a spoil sport when you do have a ROOF.

Robin Babu

Increasing pollution in Chennai

Chennai, being one of the major cit-ies in India has been on the course

of development for the past few years. After being announced as the capital of Tamil Nadu, Chennai has shown a steady growth which has increased the living standards of people and this con-dition has also created an imbalance in the ecosystem of the city.In the recent years, the traffic within the city limits seem to be higher and an increase in the number of private vehicles entering the city have been re-corded in the previ-ous years. And this situation has drasti-cally increased the traffic violations as well as it has created a greater impact on the environmental condition of the city.Despite, various combined measures have been taken by the government and the Tamil Nadu state pollution control board (PCB) the pollution caused by the smoke emitted from the vehicles have not decreased to a notable extent. “We are much concerned about the in-crease in the number of vehicles every

year and we conduct various classes to students and also we try to create en-vironmental awareness among the peo-ple through various mediums” says Dr. R. Annamalai who conducts classes for teachers and students on environment.A recent study by the PCB has re-vealed the fact that about fifty per-cent of the vehicles have exceeded the emission standards and also there is an increase in the number of private ve-

hicles by 10 percent annually. “We have quoted certain emis-sion limits for the ve-hicles and we are tak-ing suitable steps to check the amount of pollution emitted by the vehicles does not exceed the limits. But

still the amount of emission is increas-ing rapidly due to urbanization and a recent study has revealed that there is a spontaneous increase in the amount of pollution within the city.” Says R.N. Rayudu, Deputy Director, Tamil Nadu pollution control board.In all it is the duty of every citizen to take care of his or her environment.

Azizulla Khan

Roof top garden: An ernest initiative. Photo: Google Images

“We are much concerned about the increase in the number of vehicles every year and we conduct various class-es to students and also we try to create environmental awareness among the people through various mediums”

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Action stations - climate changeThe G8 summit showed the world, and then

unprecedent¬ed challenge the world facer on climate change, many countries declared that

they will be a lot of initiatives to stop or shower the process of climate change. But these just won’t do. But a lot of good initiatives like U.S intent to reduce green house gar emissions by 80% by mid century. President Barack Obama has been promised a lot for his heartening initiatives. He also highlights the need for tough new automotive standards that would save fuel. Even Australia is on the night track for curbing climate change. Prime Minister Kevin Rudd announced his plans for opening of a global carbon capture and storage facility in Australia to develop clean coal technology an a public good. James Lovelock, an eminent British scientist says that this measurer is insufficient for a tough battle ahead what he likes to call “Climate war”. On negative note leaders of major economies have no firm plans for curbing emissions after 2020. The target date of 2050 for reduction of Green house proposed by these countries are too far fetched. The resolve to keep global warming to less than 2 degree Celsius may and upon nothing more than a remote wish. The only way forward for the G-8 and other high emission coun¬tries is to work together and fight this “Climate war”. They must sit together and go on about the hard task of setting concrete goals for the next decade and beyond. The importance of China and India in the global climate equation has been growing. China has already taken a major step forward where¬as India’s National plan is almost denied of details. India has said it

won’t accept emission target an it might affect its poverty alleviation effort. It is true that most Indian household is energy deprived. But the path of National development is carbon- intensive. Its high time India must priorities arrear such a power generation lighting and transport. Cutting duties on fuel guzzling sports utility vehicles as the 2009-10 budget has proposed, is definitely not the way forward. Gusted we should concentrate more on reducing duties for low emissions, clean small cars instead of luxury ways. It would also be good if we could make our public transportation system more energy efficient as well as profitable. Of course National Development is very important and cov¬ers on top of the priority list. But with only words being spoken and his actions being taken, the ques¬tion remains whether our national development should take more im¬portance than trying to curb our green house gas emissions.

For the first time in the history, we have seen the whole nation standing together in the Global

fight against the climate change. “Global Warming” has been an alarming topic in each and every part of the globe. We all know that forest plays a very im-portant role in maintaining the ecological balance but still our instinct never gets tired of invading mother nature. Many incidences have arisen related to the issue of global warming. Even though leaders and experts have put their heads in together, it is still difficult to find solutions to this actual irresolvable issue.At a recent study of climate change, over the north-east part of India it has been reported that both Cher-rapunji and Mawsynram in Meghalaya (which are the wettest places in the world recording the highest rainfall annually) are now witnessing less rain due to climate change and this is affecting the livelihoods of thousands of villagers who cultivate paddy and maize. The northeastern states receive the highest amount of rainfall throughout the whole country. More or less the areas remain wet the whole year but for the past five years there has been a dramatic change. For the first time in history, Manipur faced the consequence of an unimaginable drought the previous year. Owing to the drought, the state has been facing various economic and financial problems. The state government had even taken up steps of submitting a memorandum to the prime minister in accordance with the issue, “Every year temperature has been in-creasing for the past five years due to the cleaning of forests and cutting down of trees for construction”, said Laisram Suresh, a local geologist from Manipur.In Tamil Naidu the number of farmer suicides has been found to be increasing every year. “Though the government has tried their level best to tackle

with this issue, there has been no definite solution till now” says Chinnasami, a local farmer from Put-lur, Tamil Nadu. “For the past 56 years I have been a farmer, I have always depended upon Mother Na-ture for my occupation, but it has been really hard for me to predict upon the nature for the pass five years. Now I have to seek for other side businesses in order to make a decent living” said Hera, a local farmer from Manipur.The number of pest species too have increased in recent years owing to the changing climatic pat-terns and have brought in various new crop and pest diseases resulting in heavy damage of crops. Dr M. Kamaraj, Agricultural Programme officer, Govt. of Tamil Nadu says “There might be some initial overall benefit due to warming for a decade or two, but-because future warming depends on greenhouse gas emissions emitted today, there has to be some sever curtailing done—if we delay action it would put global agriculture on an inexorable trajectory to serious damage”.To root out the hazardous effects of global warming and climate change and to make the agricultural land safe and usable, it is important to maintain the ecological balance of nature so that it would slowly reduce or curtail the ongoing rise in temperature. India being an agricultural country should be aware of all these problems. We should not wait for the gov-ernment to take measures for these problems instead we should go ahead and take initiatives to convert our agricultural land into something that looks more lush and green, which then would boost the overall economic status of our country. If being indian citiz-ins we do not understand the importance of the vari-ous different factors contributing to our economy, India will suffer greatly at the hands of this heartless phenomenon called climate change.

The Copenhagen climate summit held from the 7th to the 18th of December 09 in Co-

penhagen, Denmark had essentially originated as a tool to handle the currently up surging dire need for a proper climate management system around the world. The summit blew the clarion, proclaiming a situ-ation of emergency and clearly indicating signs of a catastrophical change. Nations for the first time had turned “brothers in arms” and knew that mortal man was merely a speck of dirt that could easily be wiped off the face of earth. Man due to his arrogance, pride and an unending supply of ignorance has always been and for sure will be, disrupting the laws of nature, covering it up under the mask of scientific advancements. Even during such trying times there were, a few countries who held there social, political and economical development well above their heads. Some developed nations had the nerve to deny any plausible participation in the summit. But the golden question being “was all this hulla baloo for a social cause?” or was it just another one of the plays, well enacted out by the UNFCCC (The United Nations framework convention on climate change) members.The summit in fact was a mere stage play, aimed at assuring the people of different nations on the initiatives being taken to handle the immutable effects of Global warming. The summit was nei-ther successful in drafting a good deal in terms of the carbon emissions with the developing nations nor was it stern enough to command a definite curb on the existing emission produce of the de-veloped nations. It in fact was handicapped by the restrain portrayed by some nations (Led by the USA) from any form of credible negotiations. The summit according to The Guardian “was one in jeopardy and in major crisis”. It was in fact used as a doomsday device to curtail the radical developments made by various developing na-tions. The summit was to pressurize the under developed countries to bring a drastic reduc-tion in their carbon emissions which indirectly would heavily inflict their overall progress.The proposed plan of action of the UNFCCC member countries included the United States of America promising a miniscule 1.3% reduction in its an-nual absolute emissions rate followed by Europe with a 20-25% reduction, China with a 40-45 % reduction, India with a proposed plan of 20-25% reduction so on and so forth. The united states of America even after being a well developed na-tion was very stingy in its proposed plan of ac-tion whereas was highly broad minded in imple-menting the proposed protocol that was supposed to be followed by all the UNFCCC members.It literally bullied the developing nations into the foray for its own betterment and gain.Considering all the facts and figures. one can eas-ily understand on how artificial and superficial the whole caucus was. These figures blindly state one point and that is that this whole plan is sim-ply nothing but forceful compulsion of develop-ing countries by superpowers to augment their already superior status and leave the under devel-oped countries to rot for the sake of attaining a suitable standered of living or easier terms the so called superficial mask of over all development.

October 2010

A play well staged

Source: www.gettyimages.com

The consequences of global warming

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Real Estate seems to be the new trendsetter as many agricul-tural lands are going down

and instead lots of buildings and other commercial plots are occurring in the city. Various large-scale industries are buying these productive lands thereby hampering the agriculture production and scenic beauty of the nationFarmers are forced to sell their land due to various reasons from natural causes to financial troubles. They do not re-ceive any help from the government and therefore are unable to continue with their cultivation. Bank Loans are charged with high interests forcing the farmers to sell their land and resort to some other employment. Says a farmer “ I tried my level best to stick on to agriculture but failed to do so. I have sold my land and with the money I conducted my daughter’s marriage. The government imposes rules to not sell our lands for commer-cial purposes but are not ready to help us protect them” The real estate groups purchase these properties and use them to construct housing apartments . Certain companies also buy these lands to set up their factories and other ac-

cessories for production. Lot of farm-ers are willing to sell their land to clear off their debts. n North Chennai near Red hills and meenjur , places known for its scenic beauty as well as impor-tant centre’s of rice fields, farmers are giving away their lands for prices as low as Rs 10,000 per cent . Arrel ,near Tuticorin known for its nice greenish land located near Thamarabarani river ,

farmers here cultivate all over the year but still are willing to sell these land due to their financial constraints . “The farmers here sell their agricultural land which has a very good yield for just Rs 6 lakhs an acre and sometimes even less. These lands are worth much more, but what is more important is that these lands have an amazing productivity too. Some financial help will help these

farmers retain their lands”, says Koyil Raj, a resident of Arrel.Other than the financial problems, even natural causes are also responsible for this .Indian farmers are faced with var-ious challenges ranging from degraded soil and depleted ground water to stag-nant crop yields. Muthu , a farmer in this area says “ We are not receiving ample funds or help to carry on. We already have a lot of debt and find it difficult to live. Farm-ing has been a family occupation but I am forced to give it up for the bet-ter interests of my family”. The Green Revolution has transformed agricul-ture in the northern states of Punjab, Haryana and Western Uttar Pradesh. It helped India to overcome food scarci-ty, but now things have taken a drastic change. Farmers are now plagued with degrad-ed soils, less ground water and stag-nant crop yields. Due to these prob-lems they are unable to continue with farming and hence sell off their lands in return for meagre sums. Govern-ment needs to come up with a solution soon in this matter as the agricultural land in our city seems to be vanishing.

Samuel Nesan

Plots for sale: Green, lush and fertile paddy fields

The elegance and serenity of the Cooum reinvented

Like all the major civilizations, the city of Chennai has flourished and

prospered along the banks of the Co-oum River.During the British rule, the Cooum River was used as a vital transport link, connecting various inaccessible areas to the heart of the city, but as time pro-gressed it gradually evolved into the longest and deepest in city drainage system in the world.Continuous disposal of wastes and ruthless exploitment at all levels has literally destroyed the legacy that the river once possessed. The prevailing condition has rendered the river highly polluted due to which there arised a great need for the cleaning and purifi-cation of the river body.Understanding the need of the hour, the corporation under the able hands of Thiru. M.K. Stalin, secretary of state has taken numerous valuable steps in resolving the rising issue. The most prominent and important being the signing of a Memorandum of under-standing (MOU) between the Singa-pore Cooperation enterprise and the Chennai rivers restoration trust. The agreement is supposed to lay concrete foundations to proper cooperation and collaboration in restoration, beautifi-cation and management of the 65Km long river body. The whole project according to the MOU is supposed to be meted out in several phases, begin-ning with the relocation of the slum

people who have inhabited the banks, all along the 65 Km long stretch of the river. “The initial stage of the project proves to be a herculean task as evacu-ation and relocation of these people is next to impossible” says Ajay, Senior executive officer, Chennai Corpora-tion.Each time the evacuations are made the encroachments are re-found-ed and inhabited within weeks making it a literal no-go situation to the corpo-ration. “It is a common sight here, we are used to it, every time government officials turn up here nothing is actual-ly done” says Ramesh, a slum dweller at the Saidapet bank of the river. Most of the slum dwellers believe that the banks of the river is their ancestral

land and shifting to a totally new and unknown area would bring in huge misfortune and an endless era of bad days upon their people. This supersti-tious belief has been seeded so deep into their minds that it has strained the government officials to use brute force to clear these people off the land.All said and done if this project material-izes letter by letter, the city of Chennai within one or two decades will have an enchanting and serene river flowing gracefully through the city, providing drinking water as well as serving as a means of transportation resolving the issue of traffic snarls in the city. The restoration plan in the near future will bring about a whole new look to city.

The Cooum river restoration drive has brought back the beauty of the river

Shwetha Sharma

BiotheneBiothene is an additive which

degrades polythene under the influence of light & heat. The addition of 2 to 3% Biothene® will produce a photochemically & thermally degradable film.*UsageBiothene contains active metal ions embedded in the polythene. Degradation starts only after the metal ions have been activated by exposure to a UV light or heat source.*How does it work ?The active agent is a metal ion and a catalyst which is added to the polythene when it is extruded. These react with sunlight and this reaction starts to break the molec-ular chains down in the material.*How long has it been estab-lished ?The original concept was devel-oped in the 1970’s by The Royal College of Forestry in Stockholm.

This Column is dedicated to all automobile enthusiasts. If you would like to share your views and thoughts on the subject, send them to www.theetip.com

ETheTIP

Fields to plots: landmarked fields in Arrel Photo:www.mondico.com

On the road to restoration: The Cooum river Photo: www.flickr.com

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The Marina’s beautification, a timely interventionSomesh.S. Menon

Chennai, Tamil Nadu’s capital, and one of the few Indian met-ros to boast of a beach, that too

the famous Marina, can now proudly say that its not just a city with archi-tectural landmarks to attract visitors, but also a well-maintained coastline as well. All this thanks to the initiative from the part of the Tamil Nadu state government in realising the importance of the fact that the state had in its hands the second longest beach in the world, without the maintaining of which, half the aura of being a Chennai resident will be gone. But now that the govern-ment has realised the importance of its coast not just as a tourist attraction but also as a cultural hotspot, numer-ous measures have been implemented in reconstructing and beautifying the beach. Walking along the famous Ma-rina will never be the same again for locals and tourists, with viewing galler-ies, landscaping and fountains, created as part of a beautification project which had been on the anvil for 3 years, being thrown open to the public.Although the beach stretches on for 13 long km, the main 3 km stretch on the mouth of the R.K. Salai road, be-ginning from opposite the campus of Madras University and extending till the Lighthouse, was the focus of this intensive renovation.With more than 50000 visitors lapping up the waves on any given day, the seacoast needed some serious repair to

meet the basic standards of being an in-ternationally reputed beach, but thanks to the heavy garbage that lay strewn across the stretch and more and more accumulating on a daily basis this was proving to be a hard task. Even the sce-nic road running beautifully parallel to

the coast didn’t allure many riders to stop and spend some time there as the conditions of the beach were far from ideal due to the constant neglect. But thankfully the government has woken up to the matter on time and can now proudly say that it has helped lay base for not just a city with an excellent in-frastructure for industries, but also one

which ranks high on the eco-friendly front as well. With a well-planned 26 crore beautifying programme, the civic authorities have ensured that now its not just the beach which will bring in the visitors and continue playing host to the various cultural programs it is so

renowned for, but also the beautifully decorated landscaping that surrounds it. Alongside 14 galleries for visitors and a four metre internal walkway along the sands and fountains, high-tech lighting arrangement has also been put in place to enable visitors enjoy the scenic beauty of the beach at night. The galleries also have floors in various ap-

pealing colour patterns adding to the attractiveness of the lush greenery.Various ethnically inspired architec-tural elements such as plazas, gazeboes and pergolas have also been construct-ed aesthetically to fit in with the sur-roundings and add a posh touch. Along the road running parallel, 428 octago-nal poles with high mast lamps set into seagull shaped light fittings have been erected, illuminating the coast spectac-ularly during the night. Also, to make it easier for tourists to reach and go back from the beach, ten state of the art bus shelters have been set up alongside. Facilities like parking areas, creation of children’s playing area, facilities for the physically challenged and setting up of a food court are currently being planned and are likely to come up soon.After such a thorough and long recon-structive programme, its unlikely that the government will allow Chennai’s pride to slip back into a miserable con-dition all over again. To prevent it from returning to its previously messy and polluted state, the use of plastics has been banned in and around the Marina in a bid to keep it clean. Also tractors attached with sand mowers can be seen daily ploughing around taking out the trash. With a clean green city being the wish of many a resident, the Marina, previously struggling has finally been rejuvenated and can finally breathe easy and continue enchanting visitors for many more years.

Is this the marina: The beach after the restoration plan initiated by the Chennai corporation Photo: Robin Babu

Re-invented and re-discovered: The Marina Photo: Robin Babu

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Fawaz Jaleel Kutty

A new form of pollution due to human activity or sometimes natural is slowly but steadily

on a rise in today’s world. Oil spills is generally the releasing of liquid petro-leum hydrocarbon to the environment. This has a very disastrous effect on the living beings mainly birds and mam-mals and can also result in the death of these beings. Oil spills happen when people make mistakes or are careless and cause an oil tanker to leak oil into the ocean. The harmful effects of this mistake then follows and turns out to have dan-gerous after-effects.The most basic cause of oil spills should be credited to the illegal dump-ers of crude oil in to the ocean in order to save the money used on decompos-ing their waste oil. From this it goes on to the extent that terrorists use them to attract the attention of countries they planned to attack. Even natural disasters like hurricanes, heavy storms etc force the oil tank to spill over and thereby results in the cause of an oil spill. Its also turning out to be part of a war strategy as a coun-try having an enemity with the others dump gallons of oil into the other na-tion’s water body. This has a serious effect on the marine food chain too thereby disturbing the balance there.Not only it affects marine life but also the land animals too. Birds succumb to death due to oil spills if their feathers are covered in oil. The bird will then be poisoned as it tries to clean itself. Animals may die because they get hy-pothermia, causing their body temper-ature to go really down, as compared to their normal status. They may die from really low body temperature. Oil may also cause the death of an animal by entering the animal’s lungs or liver. The animal will then be poisoned by the oil. Oil also can kill an animal by

blinding it. The animal will not be able to see and be aware of their predators. If they are not aware of other animals, they may be eaten. Oil spills sometimes are the reason for animals becoming endangered. This means that a certain type of animal is getting so small that it is in danger of becoming extinct.The Persian Gulf War: Though this war in the Middle East in the early months of 1991 was very short, it left behind a very negative impact on the environ-ment. Gallons of oil(2.5 to 4 million barrels) were dumped into the Persian Gulf. It was the largest ever oil spill record-ed in the world’s history. This oil spill is believed to have destroyed or se-verely disrupted the area’s entire ma-rine ecosystem. The oil covered some 600 square miles of sea surface and

blackened 300 miles of coastline. The waters of the Gulf contain coral reefs, mangrove swamps, and beds of sea grass and algae, as well as birds, sea turtles, fish and marine mammals. All these plants and animals were affected by the oil. Mangrove swamps and other kinds of wetlands are very sensitive to oil be-cause their root systems are above wa-ter and can become coated or clogged with oil.Several legislations have been passed against this issue of oil spills. In India and in numerous other countries, a National Response Centre has been set up so that grievances against this man-made calamity can be reported. Similarly governments all the world have set up their own centres to look into this issue because the impact left out by these spills. The cleaning up

of these spills is yet another hectic task which involves a great amount of time and money. There are many ways to stop the spread of oil in the ocean. Workers place a boom around the tanker that is spilling oil. Booms collect the oil off the water. A boom is placed somewhere before an oil spill. They are placed around an entrance to the ocean, like a stream. They are also placed around a habitat with many ani-mals living there. The general public in the countries are asked to reduce their consumption of oil so that lesser amount of oil will have to be exported that in turn reduces the risk of oil spills. Oil is an exhaust-ible and a non-renewable resource so that this simple practise will also help in saving enough oil for the future gen-erations to inhabit our mother land.

Oil Spills - A calamity as a result of human activity

Tecnologically advanced, Environmentally destoyed

Chennai City is technologically highly advanced as compared to the other cities in the country.

But at what cost? Is a question that lingers in all our minds. The Madrasipattinam which was once known for its beauty and grandeur remains no more, a fact that we have to accept with greif.As we go on to check the environmental condition of the city, we find that it has been severely affect-ed from the so called development that it has made in recent years. In early years, most part of the city looked green and lush with vegetation. But due to rapid population explosion, the city lost most of the green covered areas. The Chennai City started to experience the wide range of environmental issues, like urban heat islands, pol-lution, and ground water depletion etc. the diminish-ing green cover areas simplifies many aspects of the natural process, thus ultimately affecting the City’s

over all progress The environmental damage had al-ready been inflicted due to the alarming rising popu-lation, rapid strive towards urbanization, increasing needs for different sources of energy and catacysmic scientific and technological advancement . It cannot be reversed unless there is collective thinking, will and effort.“Most of the forest area is cleared for construction of shopping malls, PVR theatres, industries, etc. This will make the city look beautiful, but they don’t think how much it will get affected by clearing the forest areas”, says S. Anand, an environmentalist. Constructions of malls, theatres, industries will get many advantages to the people. They will get good jobs, earn money and can live a happy life. Whatever it is but it all depends on nature, but if the nature gets affected than naturally they will affected and there is no need of having a good job. They have to fight for

their life.To make Chennai City an environmentally free zone we need to plant more trees so that it will make the city look green as we it used to be in early years and to control the rapid growth of population as increased population reduces the forests areas. If the city identifies these issues and immediatly executes necessaty steps then there will still be hope for a re-plenishment. Being a welfare state with a sole motive of welfare of the people was something of the past, now along with the people the welfare of the environment that they live in is uttermost important. As if the environment remains clean and green, the people to will combinely progree towards a better fu-ture with a happy mind and a healthy body.In a one liner, being tech savy is the current fashion of the world but being eco-friendly is surely gong to be one in the near future.

The present day scenario of the impact of tecnological advancements on the city

Amarjit Sharma

Designed by: Robin Babu

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12 Colorful beaded noses, stitched hands, wooly hair, glued eyes and a passion for comical

words; these are the elements that ren-der ‘Ramu chacha’, a puppet character who is a crowd favorite and leaves the crowd in splits every time he gets on the dais’. These last colorful strokes of the In-dian ethnicity have been invigorated to enact out an array of social respon-sibilities and duties both with passion and pride.Puppetry a traditional art form of India, once donned the role of an important instrument, creating public awareness, fostering inter-community ties, enter-taining children and educating the vil-lage folk. But with the gradual procession of time there came a period when it had lost all its essence, “the charm, the charisma, the splash of colors had remained no more, being practiced by only a hand-ful of people dotted throughout India; it had become an art form that existed only in books” says Dr. V. Bhavani Shankar, an environmental education-ist.But now times have changed, the art form has breathed a new lease of life, and has been promulgated back into the Indian culture. “The art form had never died out; it had only been ignored and shown a blind eye to by the people as there were too busy with their eyes stuck on a assort-ment of idiot boxes” says R. Bhanu-mathi, an environmental educationist and managing trustee of Pavai centre for Puppetry. Puppetry now has become as effective as a cinema or a soap opera, the only difference being that this art form ca-ters to a target audience and on an in-dividualistic issue.“Puppetry has been re-discovered and has been kindled to serve contrasting yet educative pur-poses like that of environmental edu-

cation (EE). EE is such that it has no qualifying age bar and is a vital need of our times; using puppets to bring out fundamental pieces of information about are environment is both educa-tional and engaging” says Dr. V. Da-kshinamurthy, State director, World Wildlife Fund (WWF), India.He fur-ther added, “The WWF, India, has tak-en earnest initiatives to institutionalize the art of puppetry as an awareness crafting tool to voice out subjects like ecology conservation, wildlife welfare and protection, appreciation of nature and bio-diversity”Other than environmental and non-governmental organizations (NGO’s), schools too have taken up puppetry to enlighten children on EE. Due to the mounting need of the hour, EE has been made as an enforced part of the syllabi, leaving the students to slog on one more lackluster theoretical subject, but there are schools who have taken up novel measures such as that of puppetry to spread out the message in a much more vibrant and enjoyable manner.“The art form has been a smash hit with the children, as in addition to learning a wide array of things, they get to try their hands out at puppetry as well” says V. Jayashree, a teacher at Kend-riya Vidyala, Anna Nagar, Chennai.Furthermore, India with its rich cultural backdrop could whip up numerous in-novative measures to use its traditional art forms for socially useful productive work. When it comes to environmental education, the art form serves as a boon to enrich the drained out brains of the students. It helps them to understand, identify and visualize their roles and duties as future citizens of the mother land. In a one liner, pulling a few strings works wonders when done for the right set of causes.

“Pulling strings” for a social cause !Puppetry, a revived art form and now an aid for ‘Environmental Education’

Robin Babu

Dummy but Funny: Ramu Chacha, a puppet charachter Photo: www.flickr.com

The worlds most shocking

Industrial Catastrophes

Part 4: The Bhopal Gas Tragedy

Timeline, Summary of events:

At the plant:

21:00 Water cleaning of pipes starts, 22:00 Water en-ters tank 610, reaction starts, 22:30 Gases are emit-ted from the vent gas scrubber tower, 00:30 The large siren sounds and is turned off.00:50 The siren is heard within the plant area. The workers escape.

Outside:

22:30 First sensations due to the gases are felt, 1:00 Police are alerted. Residents of the area evacuate, 2:00 The first people reached Hamidia Hospital, 2:10 The alarm is heard outside the plant, 4:00 The gas-es are brought under control, 7:00 A police loud-speaker broadcasts: “Everything is normal”.

The Bhopal disaster or Bhopal Gas Tragedy is the world’s worst industrial catastrophe. It occurred on the night of December 2-3, 1984 at the Union

Carbide India Limited (UCIL) pesticide plant in Bho-pal, Madhya Pradesh, India.

This column is an informative column aimed solely at providing information, those who would like to share their views on the issue can send them to

www.thewmsindustrialcatastrophes.com

Around midnight on Decem-ber 2–3, 1984, there was a leak of methyl isocyanate (MIC) gas and other substances from the plant, resulting in the exposure of several thousands of people. Estimates vary on the death toll. The official im-mediate death toll was 2,259 and the government of Mad-hya Pradesh has confirmed a total of 3,787 deaths related to the gas release. Other government agencies estimate 15,000 deaths. Oth-ers estimate that 8,000 died within the first weeks and that another 8,000 have since died from gas-related diseases. A government affidavit filed in the Supreme Court in 2006 stated that of the 558,125 cas-es of injury resulting from the disaster, 516,406 (92.5%) were minor, 38,478 (6.8%) were tem-porary partial disablement while 0.7% (~3,900) were se-verely and permanently dis-abled.

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Agricultural tecniques : A blessing in disguise

In an innovative and scientifically sound attempt to reverse the ad-verse changes caused in the envi-

ronment due to climate change (global warming et al), scientists have taken up a new agenda to combat the problem using environmentally secure new-age agricultural techniques, that has got to do with food systems that are localized in nature, as well as organic, sustain-able agriculture, as far as mitigating the much talked about climate change is concerned. Though one can debate quite vengeful-ly against the concept of a fully organic agriculture arena and food system, cit-ing the example of the green revolution that has proved to be quite successful in the past using fertilizers and pesti-cides and manures extensively, as far as quantity of crop and foodgrains are concerned; this does not really under-mine the scientific evidence that as far as consumption of energy and time are concerned, organic farming still beats the ongoing practices which are re-lated to those of the green revolution, though in some cases machine usage might be quite a bit extensive in na-ture. This fact has been backed up by thorough researches done in the field of machine using organic farming, in case of several items such as apple and bar-ley grain. Specially at a time when so much furore is being gone through due to energy conservation, this technique should come in handy, as it ensures better crop quality and quantity, while resorting to no adverse agencies that are likely to tamper with the quality of the food crops. Moreover, the organi-cally farmed food crops are favourable in degree, as far as nutrition levels are concerned.The fact that the ongoing

processes of food production, along with manufacturing and marketing , are taking up oodles of energy, which could have been put to much better use with a little bit of planning and consideration beforehand. “One of the research insti-tutions in Sweden have recently found out that the energy spent in produc-ing one bottle of ketchup is astonish-ingly more than it should have been, as it includes six whole other subsys-tems, such as agriculture, processing, packaging, transport, shopping and household. So, it has been found out that while energy content in one kg of

tomato paste is about 0.00432 GJ, the energy spent on one kg of tomato paste is close to 4190 GJ. This alone pro-vides an estimate to how much energy is being wasted everyday…” said Mr. M Amirthalingam, a senior professor of Environmental education, C. P. R. Environmental education centre.More-over, organic farming and sustainable agriculture that includes the system of localized food system ensures less car-bon dioxide emission, thereby taking care of the carbon footprints efficiently. “There are a few simple steps that can be used to ensure that mitigation would

be done in the case of global climate change. They are: undertaking organic farming, planting crop varieties that re-flect sunlight back out to space more efficiently, reducing consumption of meat, applying fertilizer precisely, growing diverse crop varieties, plant-ing trees in strategic locations in farms, staggering planting of crops and using energy efficient systems in running of farms,” said Mr. J. Murali, Regional Coordinator, Southern region.May be it is high time that India takes starts moving along the path of sus-tainable agriculture that promises less

Techniques like sustainable agriculture and organic farming help farmers nullify the wrath of the climate change

Sowrav Bhowmik

Golden harvest: A ragi field near Guduvancheri, Chennai Photo: Naveen Nathan

From the beginning of the existence of human race in the earth there has been occurring certain

change in the global climate which has affected the life of many different organisms in land and sea but that has been replace with human induced increase in the concentration of greenhouse gas which has brought the raise of the present day universal issue the Global Warming. For the past one decade global warming has added a great trouble to the marine ecosystem which added to its problem of over fishing and costal pollution. From the tropical coral reefs to polar-ice edge and from the zooplankton to the polar bears has been facing problem adjusting to the warm climate due to the global warming. “The warming of air tem-perature is due to the over emission of greenhouse gas and carbon dioxide and this leads to the warming of the water temperature”, said Dr. V. Daksinamur-thy, State Director of World Wildlife Fund (WWF) India. “ The surface temperature has increased 1de-gree Celsius in the past century and it is expected to increase another three degrees in the next 100 years by then the whole marine specious would be wiped out by the warm waters”, he added.The global warm-

ing has brought about the melting of ice glaciers which causes the rise in sea level and the growth of phytoplankton has been affected severely. “Most of the marine bodies depend on the phytoplankton (mi-croscopic plants) for their living and as they grow slow in warm water the amount of phytoplankton be-comes less and this endangers the marine life”, said Dr. N.M. Ishwar, Executive director of the Group for Nature Preservation and Education (GNAPE).

The reduction in phytoplankton has a great effect on the food chain of marine predators such as sea birds and marine mammals. “The phytoplankton is the base of the food chain in the marine ecosystem”, said Dr. V. Daksinamurthy.“The Global warming has had a greater effect on the poles which has led to the melting of ice and has affected the life of the marine mammals and the penguins”, said Dr. N.M. Ishwar.

“There has been a decline in the number of penguin and the crab eater seals for the past two years due to the reduced amount of food available in the food web”, said the same. “There is increased amount of migration of the Reel fish, crabs and snails to the polar region from the coastal region, reduced reproduction and increased mortality among the different species of sea bird, fishes and sea lion along the coastal areas a due to

the warming of the water surface”, said Dr. V. Dak-sinamurthy.The world has realized the need to take some steps to control global warming in order to survive in this earth. The G8 summit which was held at Copenhagen was mainly to take a few steps in order to reduce the emission of excess carbon dioxide and green house gas which will somewhat

help in controlling global warming. There has to be a proper agreement among the G8 countries for the deal to be signed and issued to all the countries of the world and once it is signed we can hope that it helps in controlling global warming and more ever help in the economic development of the countries across the world and bring about a change for the better.

Marine Eco-systems on the verge of extintionEbenezer Sudharan

“The phytoplankton is the base or the building block of the food chain in the marine ecosystem and is vital for bal-anced existence”

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Adyar River is one of the pollut-ed River in Chennai city today and is located between Guindy

and Saidapet railway station which has today turned into a drainage course due to dumping of waste by the public.Adayar River is polluted with effluents and trash from domestic and commer-cials sources and is also being spoiled by the filth and pollution. Due to this reason the quality of the water is now highly toxic and completely non-pota-ble. Most of the wastes garbage from the city is being dumped to this River. Rapid industrialization and urbaniza-tion is also one of the problems that led to severe contamination to this River. The polluted and stinky smell that comes from the River has been af-fected to many people staying within the surroundings.Silvy Mary, a housewife who resides nearby the Adyar River has told that “the polluted river has affected not only to her family but also to other people living nearby this river”. “They faced major problems during rainy season as flies from the polluted river used to come over their houses and many of them used to suffer from different kind of sickness like cold, fe-ver, diarrhea and many kind of infec-tious diseases,” she said.Another resi-dent, Fatima said that “sometimes their huts used to got fire due to the extreme heat in the city and in such kind of in-cidents it happens that they have to end up the whole day and night by staying in the roadside as they don’t have a proper shelter to stay in such difficult time.” She also said that, “she earned her living by picking up garbage and dirt from around the places so that

she could provide food for herself and her family.” Malar, a housewife and a mother of two children says that, “The River has affected most of the families in the surroundings, and her two chil-dren used to fall sick most of the time due to exposure to the polluted water. Moreover as she’s from a poor back-ground so she doesn’t have enough money to take medicine all the time for her two children.”“Nowadays people living within the area are facing a major problem due to no access to proper sanitation and safe drinking water,” says Vikram, a call center employee living in the same locality. He further added by saying that “they had also approached the lo-cal authorities to complain against the rising situation, but even after multiple visits no initiatives or precautions have

been taken on to clean up this unhy-gienic River.”Water pollution not only affects human being but it also affects other living mammals especially to the aquatic organism like fishes and other invertebrates which resides under the water. It is today one of the major problem in the global context and it has been suggested that it is the lead-ing worldwide cause of deaths and dis-eases. Water pollution also occurs when pol-lutants are discharged directly or in-directly into the water bodies without adequate treatment. These pollutanta create all sorts of water borne diseases, allergies etc. The Government must come with some suggestion to clean up this polluted River not only for the benefit of the people living within the area but for the community as a whole.

Adyar river - A river body submerged in human waste

Overflowing with waste: One of the banks of the river Photo: www.flickr.com

Lari Kynthelin Wajri Dorji Wangmo

Lack of sanitation has been going on Pallavaram streets for the past

few years. Due to this, all the people in this area have been fully disappointed. Maintenance of the environment in Pallavaram is in a real soup. Garbage and debris are seen every-where and people just ignore it. “My relative lives in Pallavaram, so I once went there and found the area so dumpy, streets were all covered with waste producing bad scent in air”, says Joe from Crompet.Less sanitation has been an entire threat to the society and natural environment. People dump everywhere making the whole area dirty and unsafe. We could see that the people are just being ig-norant, they don’t bother about others but all they do is dump. They throw the waste instead of burning it. Palla-varam has become highly congested and dirty these days as thousands of visitors are getting registered every-where, whereby increasing to more population resulting in less sanitation. “I’ve been living in Pallavaram for the past three years, every time I clean my compound, the neighbours keep on lit-tering it. I even complained but it’s all in vain. This process is still going on and I can’t explain anything to these orthodox people. I plea the local mu-nicipality to do something against this situation”, says D.K.Dutta.Pallavaram is underdeveloped. For in-stance, the place Gandi Salai is worst of the worst. People living in this area are most probably illiterate and un-aware of the sanitations. They live a life of what their grandparents have been living before. They hardly know about the cleanliness and safety. Here the people raise cows and goats where-by making the area so stinky and ghast-ly. “We are farmers and we are happy with our own lifestyle, to stay clean is not a real matter, we are fine with what we do”, says Jansi, an ordinary farmer.“Such happenings may cause a trouble in the near future, many diseases and vast problems may arise whereby kill-ing lots of people. To stay clean and healthy is a must in every individual’s life, otherwise it would be a threat to themselves. Peo-ple should know the outcome of unsan-itation and be aware of it. They should cope up and fight against it, only then we’ll be able to help them in leading a good healthy life”, proclaims Mr. Ma-ran, Executive officer, Chennai corpo-ration.

Lack of Sanitation in Pallavaram, Chennai

Northeast India is largely dependent on the monsoon for its agricultural activities. The State normally receives

heavy rainfall during the month of May and June but instead it has experienced the highest rainfall deficit in the last few years.The North East Comprises of seven States namely Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Manipur, Mizoram, Megha-laya, Tripura, which is also called the seven sisters of In-dia. This year, the monsoon has played hide and seek in the region with Manipur tak-ing the biggest beating. Ac-cording to the records from the Meteorological Depart-ment, Manipur, recorded minimum per cent of rainfall, making it the worst affected State in the region, followed by Nagaland, Meghalaya, Assam, Mizoram, Tripura and Arunachal Pradesh in descending order with low rainfall shortage.“In the early 20th century, Manipur had about maximum number of wetlands. But today even the few existing ones

are on the verge of drying up because of climate change and human interference”, says Konsam Rajen Singh, a local environmentalist.The cutting down of forest areas for culti-vation and construction which led to the decreasing number of wetlands. The “Loktak Lake”, which is one of the largest fresh wa-ter lakes in the north-east region, which is also the lifeline

of the people of Manipur, is becoming dry because of the rise in temperature.To cope with the situation, the Government of Manipur announced that an action would be formulated to con-serve the existing wetlands and protect the ecosystem to check climate change.In all improper rainfall has played spoil sport and has

brought upon great misfortune over the people of manipur destoying both life and property. The beauty and serenity of the state now remains dry or over wet for most of the parts of the year clearly forecasting signs of an immense chapter of climate change.

“In the early 20th century, Manipur had about maximum number of wetlands. But today even the few existing ones are on the verge of drying up because of climate change and human interfer-ence”

Amarjit Sharma

Manipur - A State Victim to Erratic rainfall

© All views and contents presented in this newspaper are the views of the concerned reporter, and neither the department of Journalism not Madras Christian College are responsible in any way.

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Advancements in Science - Will it help tackle global warming ?

Researchers and scientists nowa-days have started encouraging

new research skills, so that man evolves into a more capable and self sufficient being and is able to tackle complex problems that confront us with ease and less strain. Scientists have started believing in the fact that, the more we equip ourselves, the more scope we will have in sustaining the present con-dition of living.Scientists of the 21st century are be-lieved to be spending out three quar-ters of their valuable time on finding out priceless solutions to the problems posed by the ever changing climate and global warming.Global warming has affected in most of the regions of the world even in our country. First we should aware of using or applying new technology which will harm the planet. Only scientists and researches cannot solve the problems. Now we cannot live normally as we did earlier.The conditions of the planet is getting dangerous day-by-day. So we should not wait for the scientist or researchers to make a new technology which will prevent from the serious dangers. In between these we should take some re-sponsibilities whether it may be aware-ness programmes, seminar, rally or whatever which helps people to under-stand the problem of climate change. It is not accurate that the new technology which the scientists going to make will

fully protect us from the dangers “says Dr R.S Lal Mohan.Greenhouse gases include carbon diox-ide as well as methane, nitrous oxide and other gases. They are emitted from fossil fuel combustion and a range of industrial and agricultural processes. We must reduce emissions of green-house gases beginning now because the complexity of the climate makes accurate prediction difficult”. Human activities have increasing impact on Earth’s environments. Of particular concern are the well-docu-mented loading of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, which has been linked unmistakably to burning of fossil fuels, and the corresponding increase in aver-age global temperature. It is recommended that strong action be taken at all levels, including govern-ment, industry, and individuals to sub-stantially reduce the current levels of greenhouse gas emissions and mitigate the likely social and environmental ef-fects of increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide.Only if the governement and the people taken austere efforts to mitigate and re-duce the effects of this rising issue can we sustain a proper living in the future.Creating timely awareness and accu-mulating knowledge on the causes too helps one to be self aware and well equipped to face the already deteriorat-ing condition.

Amarjit Sharma

Today when the country is mak-ing unimaginable progress eco-nomically, socially and cultur-

ally who in their wildest dreams would have heard of subjects who are still un-aware of the term ‘waste disposal’, but all said and done the word is true.People till date undergo a dilemma when it comes to the disposal of wastes. In a city like Chennai, it is a common sight to find over flowing garbage bins, sewers and piles of solid waste sprin-kled all along the road side. The wastes removed off the butchery and poultry shops are in a way non-disposable, these wastes promulgate all kinds of diseases, produce foul smell and ren-ders the neighborhood both unhygienic and unhealthy.According to a recent survey conducted in Chennai, there are around 10 poul-try shops in Sheik Mainstrey Street in Royapuram. The people living there complain of all sorts of problems that they have to undergo on a daily basis. “Almost all the time we find bird feath-ers remaining scattered in our house, these feathers bring in all kinds of germs and also instigates allergies among the children in the house” says Anand, a businessman residing in the same locality. The foul smell of the raw

decaying flesh turns out to be a pain-ful plight to the local residents as it throws in a disgusting and dilapidated veil over the culture and hospitality of the place. The highlights of the sur-

vey were that the problem especially reached the pinnacle in residential ar-eas, due to lack of proper facilities, the wastes that were produced in these ar-eas where usually dumped or accumu-lated in nearby empty plots and waste lands.Other findings of the survey in-

cluded the fact that various new shops were sprouting up in and around edu-cational and other government institu-tions and were literally destroying the locality bringing in harmful elements

like pollution, improper waste disposal etc.“The sight of the birds and dogs feeding on the flesh and the decaying smell near the poultry shops creates a nauseating feel” says Vikas, a student at the Guru Nanak college of Arts and science, Velachery, Chennai.Abdulla, a

butchery shop owner in Velachery says “we dispose our wastes properly, but occasionally during festival seasons the waste that runs out of the shop is of a larger quantity due to which they are disposed off then and there itself”.All these issues project the fact that the disturbing problem of waste disposal is part responsibility of the corporation as well part of the general public. If the corporation provides proper amenities such as metal bins, dhallos, garbage collecters appointed for each and every individual street to curb the prevailing situation and similarly if the people make good use of the services rendered to them, then the whole chap-ter of waste disposal can be uprooted from its very roots and can be literally dissolved to extinction.Waste disposal should be such that it neither creates harm to the oublic nor to the environment. It should be scru-tinised to a limited area out out of the city limits and should be decomposed in an environment friendly manner. Burning the wastes on a whole, throw-ing them into river body further ham-pers the whole situation and creates other irresolvable issues which further pose a severe threat to the smooth fun-tioning of the society.

Waste disposal - An Irresolvable problem

Drainage or garbage: Sheik mainstray street, Royapuram Photo: Naveen Nathan

Shwetha Sharma

A Splendid catch: A Farmer-fisherman with his catch of Jilebi (a fish) at a lake near Guduvanchery, Kanchipuram district, Tamil Nadu Photo: Robin Babu

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OutpostThe Environmental

Team: Amarjit Sharma, Aparna SaiEditor-in-Chief and Designer: Robin Babu

Sub-Editors: Robin Babu, Sowrav Bhowmik and Fawaz Jaleel Kutty

The Adyar eco-park Nooks and Corners :

Adyar Eco Park (also known as Adyar Poonga) is an ecological park being set up by the Tamil Nadu Road Development Corpo-ration (TNRDC) and the Government of Tamil Nadu in a 50:50

joint venture in the Adyar estuary area of Chennai, India. According to the government, the project is expected to cost around 100 million rupees which will include the beautification of 358 acres (1.45 km2) of land.

Early phase:

The improvement did not begin until clearance in June 2004. Once com-pleted, it is claimed to become the first eco-tourism venture in the state. A major portion of the boundary wall for the park was built by the Chennai Corporation in 2006 at a cost of 15 million rupees, while the remaining improvements could not be carried out owing to encroachments on the land. Following action by the civic body, the squatters of Rajah Gramani Thottam were removed and allotted to Slum Clearance Board tenements in Semmenchery in early July 2007. The issue was also taken up by the members of the Corporation Council. As a result, the remaining portion of compound wall was made higher.

Progress:

Tamil Nadu Urban Infrastructure Financial Services Limited has been charged with engaging consultants to develop a master plan and invite bidders for development of the park. The Adyar Creek Trust has been set up by the government of Tamil Nadu to coordinate the execution of the project. The Chief Secretary to the Government of Tamil Nadu is the chairpersonfor the trust and the secretaries in the Finance Department, Municipal Administration & Water Supplies, Highways Department, Public Works Department, Environment and Forest Department, and the Commissioner, Corporation of Chennai are the trustees.M. Karunanidhi, Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu laid the foundation stone for the project in August 2007.

First of its kind: The Adyar Poonga ( in tamil word for ‘garden’) an innovative-initiative by the Chennai Metropolitan Corporation Photo: www.wikipedia.org

The Adyar poonga is home to 62 species of plants, 90 species of birds, 25 species of reptiles and amphibians, 56 species of butterflies, 20 differ-ent dragonflies and 30 species of fish and other numerous exotic species of flaura and fauna.

Facts and Figures:

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Compiled by: Robin Babu