By Morning Star Sumer
“Pala moves 2 Bills on coal mine areas” blared the caption of a news item on page 1 (ST JULY 10, 2014). Since he was elected to the 15th Lok Sabha in 2009, the Shillong Parliamentary Constituency MP had happily sunk into a deep stupor. Now, five years on, he is rudely shocked out of that torpor by a time bomb set up within his own back yard by the National Green Tribunal (NGT). Introducing the 2 bills now is a last ditch effort at damage control. Unfortunately, for his image makeover, his move is seen as a selfish one being concerned only about his vested interests. Indeed this move only highlights his lethargy because questions are asked as to where he was when the state was embroiled in the ILP agitation. We ask now, where was he in 2011, when this writer barged into the Dy. CM’s – Rowell Lyngdoh’s – office to draw attention to the LARR Bill being introduced then only to be told that the Government was not aware of it. Also, as our MP, he should have taken active part in the debate when it was tabled in the Lok Sabha. The fact is, he did not.
The 2 bills moved by him now relate only to his selfish interest that his coal mines should not come within the purview of the NGT. His move also pleases Mukul Sangma, the Chief Minister and other coal barons who have crowded out other Congress politicians from the CM’s cabinet. Here we see the truth in the oft-repeated quotation of a pithy statement that “birds of a feather flock together”. Not long ago, just before the 2014 election of members to the 16th Lok Sabha, the CM could not stomach the idea of re-nomination of V.H. Pala as a candidate from the Shillong Parliamentary Constituency; now they are hand in glove in the game to negate the good work of the NGT.
It is abhorrent that these “birds of a feather” should invoke the provisions of the Sixth Schedule to the Constitution to argue their way out of the issue; still more abhorrent is their resort to sob stories of their retrenched workers’ having to abandon, and, even to sell, their children to wriggle out of their situation: we may soon hear that these retrenched workers are committing suicide en masse!! Such arguments by or from the coal barons and politicians who seem to entertain no thought at all about their social responsibilities towards their employees who are mostly non-tribals or non-indigenous tribals! No epithet is too strong to apply to these “birds” for their total disregard of the inalienable rights of all people to enjoy the earth as equals in every way within the constraints of the laws devised by their own ingenuity/genius. They care nothing for others. They pretend not to have heard of the UNO’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 1948, which they unashamedly set at naught.
Environmentalists and ecologists use the phrase “delicate balance of nature” to warn us that nature is a delicate creature which may be easily upset and go awry if not properly understood and used. The pursuit of individual economic progress and well-being sounds very well in election campaign manifestoes and speeches to inveigle unwary voters; but is a perilous philosophy to practise as a state policy to encourage it. Such a policy engenders greed among the citizens and will lead to everyone playing the game of one-upmanship which we are witnessing today in every sphere of human activity. To our coal barons the game is for making money hand over fist with nary a thought for the less privileged. In a word it is greed.
All this philosophizing would go over the heads of the coal barons who are not sufficiently educated and even over the heads of those who are regarded as being well-educated. It is relevant, therefore, to draw attention to some facts that we have to consider when considering the issue of coal mining worldwide. The most important ones now are, resource depletion, population growth and runaway technology.
Coal is a fossil fuel which is not made or manufactured by man; it cannot be recycled. Economists call it ‘capital’; but they omit the fact that it is not replaceable – it is irreplaceable. Once used or consumed it is lost forever. Fossil fuels take a very long time to form. Scientists tell us that the hard coal (anthracite) that we use today was formed of trees and vegetation over a period of 4,000 million years, during what geologists call the Carboniferous Age/Period in the earth’s evolution. The trees and vegetation that die and decay today in some inaccessible place will have to undergo the same process for that same long period of time to become the hard coal that we have today formed of the raw materials of 4,000 million years ago. This is what some economists call ‘natural capital’ which, once depleted cannot be replenished. So, by treating this natural capital as income we are depriving posterity of this capital which is being depleted by this generation.
Population growth will put greater pressure on land which is needed to accommodate and feed the growing number of people jostling for space to survive. At the rate that the earth’s population is growing as indicated in successive censuses, it will not be long before its impact will become overwhelming.
Technology has come a long way since the advent of the locomotive and automobile. Today technology is advancing at such breakneck speed that the vocabulary of jargons it engenders is expanding so thick and fast that it is impossible for anyone, not even a so-called whiz kid, to keep pace with it to be able to claim that one is even just aware of it. We witness today the rapid solution of seemingly insoluble problems through the so-called apps in computer technology. In the field of mining, the engineering technology has been advancing so rapidly that we now have giant excavating machinery that can complete in one day a piece of work that would take a hundred men several days to accomplish. This is what we call runaway technology: it leaves us gasping for breath trying to keep pace with it. It enables us to exploit nature so that its resources may be depleted before even the next generation can take over from the present generation. It means that posterity will have no more natural resources to exploit! We of this generation should feel guilty for depriving our progenies of the wealth of God’s earth.
The lesson is clear. Use as much as you need; neither more nor less. We should not be tempted to overwork and overproduce. Runaway technology helps us to over produce thereby depleting the resources part of which this generation should hold in custody for posterity.
This rapid depletion of natural resources should be arrested or even be stopped. Going on at the rate we are doing now will take us rapidly to the stage that the rich become richer and the poor become poorer so rapidly that the rate of increase of riches and the slide to poverty become exponential and would hasten the advent of anarchy which would be a revolution to usher in another social transformation! It would be tragic to wait for that to happen. It would be far better to forestall it. We ought to reflect deeply and long on the cost in human lives that past revolutions had exacted from the population of those times. Are we willing to go through those experiences again?