India faces nature’s fury; hotter earth ravaging South Asia
By Our Special Correspondent
New Delhi, July 11: Trucks and cars have been washed away in the higher reaches of Himachal Pradesh. Beas and Parvati Rivers are sweeping down the hills with fury. Sutlej River in Punjab is also in a spate. The rivers are overflowing, and the hydro-power projects have to open all gates to let the waters gush down the hills.
Hotels in Manali and Mandi have been washed away. Tourists are stranded and many of them are missing. Twitter messages are circulating of the missing people in the hills. Officially, more than 35 people have lost their lives.
Delhi too was marooned after heavy downpour, while the Yamuna River in the national capital is flowing above the danger mark. Officials’ residences of the bureaucrats in the national capital were also flooded, and some of them had to shift out to the state guest houses in the Chanakyapuri area.
Glaciers in the Antarctica are melting faster, scientists have been warning for a long time. Earth is hotter. The average temperature of the world breached 17 degrees level last week and stayed above consistently. The scientists explain that a hotter earth would mean more moisture in the air and that will translate into heavier downpours.
South Asia is battling the worst phase of the climate change. Pakistan had faced the super floods last year, worst in 10 years, which left devastating trails in half of the country, leaving thousands of the people dead. The Islamic country was ravaged to the extent that the people faced one of the worst food crises ever.
The climate change mitigation discussions in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt last year was dominated by the ravaging trails of super floods in Pakistan. Pakistani and Maldivian ministers for climate change had passionately argued the case for immediate commitment to the financing for the mitigation efforts, which was reiterated with $100 billion annual funding plan.
But the world appears missing the bus, for the United Nations Report had claimed last year that none of the 200 countries which had signed the pact for the carbo emission curb efforts actually met the target. In this backdrop, the dramatic drought conditions in China, Latin America and even the US seen last year appear to have not warned the world leaders, as the visible impacts are now being seen in the northern parts of India.
The scientists had grimly noted that February this year had been more like summer in place of being the fag-end of the Winter. Drought spells and sudden and sustained downpours are now norms in South Asia.
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