There are more environmental conflicts in India than any other country, and more clashes are over water (27 perccent) than any other cause, according to the recently released Global Environmental Justice Atlas (EJAtlas).
India has 222 listed conflicts – in proportion to population, there are many more – followed by Colombia and Nigeria with 116 and 71 conflicts, respectively, according to the EJAtlas, an interactive map of 1,703 global ecological conflicts, categorised by cause, such as water management, waste management, fossil fuels and climate justice, and biodiversity conservation.
With India currently facing the worst crisis in a decade and on course to becoming “water-scare” within nine years, as IndiaSpend reported last month, the scale of the conflicts listed in the Atlas further indicate a worsening situation.
The conflicts over water are most evident in Himachal Pradesh, and most are related to hydroelectric projects, often planned without considering the needs and consent of local communities. Similar conflicts have been recorded in Jammu and Kashmir, Jharkhand, Manipur, Mizoram, Orissa and Sikkim, among other states.
Most Indian conflicts listed in the EJAtlas appear to be a consequence of the country’s expanding economy. For example, the raging underground fires in the Jharia coal mines in Jharkhand – an exclusive storehouse of prime coking coal – were first seen a century ago, started spreading in the 1970s and, currently, more than 70 mine fires are underway, polluting the air, water and land and devastating the health of the locals.
Several conflicts centre around garbage dumping sites, such as Deonar in Mumbai, Sultanpur and Bandhwari villages near the national capital region, Kodungaiyur near Chennai, Eloor in Kerala and villages around Bangalore. Across India, more than three million truckloads of garbage is dumped without being treated, as IndiaSpend has reported, a manifestation of growing urbanisation.
Although the EJAtlas lists 220 environmental conflicts in India, there are many more. “You should realize that 220 is in proportion to population,” said Joan Martinez-Alier, Professor of Economics and Economic History at the Autonomous University of Barcelona and director of the EJAtlas project. “India has more cases than any other country because good work has been done on the EJAtlas by our partners at JNU (Jawaharlal Nehru University) and also obviously because India is the country with the largest population in the world.”
