Narmada Bachao Andolan

The Narmada Bachao Dam 30 major,135 medium and 3000

minor dams over Narmada river in Maharashtra, UP and Gujarat.
It includes Sardar Sarovar Project which will irrigate 187 lakh
hectares of land. 1450 Kw electricity will also be generated, but at
what cost? 26,000 hectares forest land and 11,320 hectares of
agricultural land will be submerged and 67,000 people will be
displaced help for resettlement ,the problem would not be solved.
These tribals can not adopt well in alien environment, as their
culture is quite different. Providing agricultural land will also be of
no use because many are not at all interested in agriculture. A
distinct culture will be extinct. The leader of the ‘Narmada
Bachao Andolan’ is Medha Patkar who started movement
against this project.
This ‘andolan’ is against the exploitation of nature and
violation of human rights. This is an project which is mythical in
nature leading to iconological degreadation.

Chandigarh Case
Recently it has come in the newspaper that I Chandigarh
5000 trees are cut ruthlessly by the administration for IT park.
The trees have been cut illegally to make land available for a new
six-lane road, leading upto the site of the new IT park and the
tree-clearing operation are without mandatory environmental
clearances, according to environment conscious resident.
 Ecosystem
An ecosystem is an assemblage of organisms(animals,
plants and other living organisms) living together with their
environment, functioning as a loose unit. That is a dynamic and
complex whole interacting as an ecological unit. Here all the
organisms are balanced with each other and their environment.

Land, air, water and their interconnection with all the

animate and inanimate objects including human beings, together
constitute ecology. Disturbance in any one of these segments will
affect badly over the whole ecosystem.

Today’s petrol and diesel create too much pollution. Modern

technologies also create pollution. Again the violation of ethical
values and human rights lead to ecological degradation. Ethical
values are related to what we should do and what we should not
do. If we attain something at the cost of others it is unethical
practice. If we achieve something following righteous means, it
indicates that we are having ethical values within us.

We cut the trees, break the mountains to build new roads, to

build more buildings. We do not bother about the consequences
because we never give a deep thought to it. We only think about
the amenities we would get. What about the pollution, what about
ethics? Acharya Jagadish Chandra Bose had proved long back,
trees and plants are living entities. We know killing a living human
being is a crime, killing or cutting trees also a crime and we cut
the trees we are criminals. Trees provide us food, shelter, clothing
which we require for our survival and do not ask anything in lieu
of that. Are we doing justice with them? We do exploit them and
exploitation is always unethical.

Consider the case of Yamuna River. If you look the colour of

water near Yamunetri it is so clean, so pure. But look at it near
Delhi, it is so contaminated, so unclean! Why? It is the fault of us.
We are responsible for this. All the nearby industries throw their
wasteful affluents into this river. Consequently water has become
polluted and thus we are killing thousands of objects that are
living on this riverbed.

We kill domestic animals for non-vegetarian food or for

making sandals. We kill elephants to get the ivory.

We are building dams or cutting trees for the need of

modern civilization. But at what cost? If we do not think from
ethical point of view, if we think like a self-centered person and
do the cost-benefit analysis, we will be perplexed to see that we
are ultimately running in loss. Disbalanced ecosystem affect
badly over all the living entities. Therefore, we must take care of
nature. we should show respect to her because she is always
providing selfless service to us through its various resources,
without expecting anything in return.

From this discussion we can realize that violation of ethical

values lead to environmental deregulation. Should we give a
second thought before taking such actions?

Therefore Indian ethos emphasizes that nature and we, the

human beings are interdependent and also interconnected
because all of us are part of the supreme soul. Therefore we must
respect nature and do not do any injustice with her. Here we can
consider the relationship between the trees and human beings.
Plants and trees when engaged in photosynthesis produce oxygen
which is beneficial for us. During our respiration process we
intake that oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide which is harmful for
us but is useful for the trees. Thus both the trees and we are
interdependent on each other. In the same manner if we cut the
trees, we ourselves cannot survive because we would not get the
oxygen. Therefore we must take maintained and everyone living
on the mother earth can live a peaceful, harmonious and
balanced life.
 If any organization takes care environment while running the
business it would help to create a healthy environment. From long
term point of view it will develop a trustworthy relationship with
the members of the society who are also in some way or the
other their customers. These customer would be loyal to this
organization. Thus indirectly it would help the company to grow
and earn more profit. Here we can give the example of ‘the
orchid’.

The Orchid: The Eco-friendly Organization:

The orchid, Asia’s first certified eco-friendly five-star hotel
and world’s only Ecotel to be certified as ISO: 14000. There is
natural light in the atrium (entrance) which saves electrical
energy. The architectural design is such that the shy roof supplies
natural light, doubly layered domes reduce heat and sound. The
swimming pool is located on the roof-tip. It acts as an insulator
from heat.

Activities Conducted: The orchid sponsored street play

arranged by MCGM for environmental awareness.

It arranged inter-school competition to old plastic bags. The

school in return will get cloth bags. The schoolthat collected
highest average number of bags per student was to be invited for
a felicitation programme and dinner.

‘Green-team staffs’ of the orchid planted several

drumstick saplings near the hotel and were accountable for the
nourishments till monsoon started.

While taking care of their growth, they used the various

resources carefully and shown sensitiveness for environmental
protection and focusing on sustainable development and are ever
conscious of the ecology. For instance, use PPE containing 15-
20%, fly ash compared to OPC or ordinary Portland cement.
Reusable PED wall panels derived from fertilized waste are used
for internal partition in lieu of red brick made from topsoil of the
earth.

They used water-based paint with minimum use of Volatile

Organic Compound (VOC). They take every possible care to save
water, one of the most precious resources that sustain life. They
save upto 50% water by using taps containing special aerators.

They use rubber-wood after processing and upgrading for

interior like window frames. This portion is not used because it is
very soft in nature. After producing rubber, sap tree is cut down.

Instead of ordinary bulbs they use PL lamps which gives light

like ordinary bulbs but consume only 25% of energy compared to
that. Eco-friendly R22 air-conditioners and refrigerators are used
in the hotel.

Instead of cut flowers, they use living husky green plants.

They sponsor for seminars on environment protection. People
living in surrounding locality and other service industries are
becoming conscious about their responsibility to mother earth.