NEW DELHI: In a bid to corner UPA at the Centre, the BJP-ruled Uttarakhand government has written to Prime MinisterManmohan Singh asking that the NTPC-run 600 MW Loharinag Pala project on the Bhagirathi river be stopped just as the state government proposed 381 MW Bhaironghati and 480 MW Pala Maneri dams were denied permission.
The letter from Uttarakhand chief MinisterRamesh Pokhriyal Nishank to the PM comes after Union finance minister Pranab Mukherjee held discussions with Union environment and forests minister Jairam Ramesh and Union power minister Sushil Kumar Shinde to conclude that the Loharinag Pala project should continue.
While Ramesh had pushed for stoppage of work on Loharinag Pala as well, NTPC and Shinde batted in favour of completing it as about Rs 650 crore had already been spent on it.
Nishank using environmental concerns as a ploy has now demanded that the NTPC project too should be shut down as it would dry up the river for a 16-kilometre patch of the river when the waters are diverted through an underground tunnel -- grounds on which the other two projects were cancelled.
The entire debate about the dams on Ganga had taken a decidedly `religious' tone with the Centre claiming environmental concerns as well as `sentiments of millions' as the reason for stopping the two dams that were to be built by Uttarakhand Jal Vidyut Nigam, a state-owned company.
A technical committee had earlier suggested that Loharinag Pala could also be shut down though it would cost the government a few hundred crores in ensuring that the half-complete structures do not cause further ecological damage and are safe in case of any tectonic activity.
But Shinde and NTPC had pointed out that besides the Rs 650 crore already spent orders worth another couple of thousand were already in the pipeline.
After Shinde and Ramesh took opposing views, Mukherjee was asked by PM to intervene and find a way out.
TOI
The letter from Uttarakhand chief MinisterRamesh Pokhriyal Nishank to the PM comes after Union finance minister Pranab Mukherjee held discussions with Union environment and forests minister Jairam Ramesh and Union power minister Sushil Kumar Shinde to conclude that the Loharinag Pala project should continue.
While Ramesh had pushed for stoppage of work on Loharinag Pala as well, NTPC and Shinde batted in favour of completing it as about Rs 650 crore had already been spent on it.
Nishank using environmental concerns as a ploy has now demanded that the NTPC project too should be shut down as it would dry up the river for a 16-kilometre patch of the river when the waters are diverted through an underground tunnel -- grounds on which the other two projects were cancelled.
The entire debate about the dams on Ganga had taken a decidedly `religious' tone with the Centre claiming environmental concerns as well as `sentiments of millions' as the reason for stopping the two dams that were to be built by Uttarakhand Jal Vidyut Nigam, a state-owned company.
A technical committee had earlier suggested that Loharinag Pala could also be shut down though it would cost the government a few hundred crores in ensuring that the half-complete structures do not cause further ecological damage and are safe in case of any tectonic activity.
But Shinde and NTPC had pointed out that besides the Rs 650 crore already spent orders worth another couple of thousand were already in the pipeline.
After Shinde and Ramesh took opposing views, Mukherjee was asked by PM to intervene and find a way out.
TOI
No comments:
Post a Comment