I travelled through Great Nicobar today.
These are the most extraordinary forests I have ever seen in my life. Trees older than memory. Forests that took generations to grow.
The people on this island are equally beautiful - both the adivasi communities and the settlers - but they are being robbed of what is rightfully theirs.
The government calls what it is doing here a “Project.” What I have seen is not a project. It is millions of trees marked for the axe. It is 160 square kilometres of rainforest condemned to die. It is communities that have been ignored while their homes have been snatched away.
This is not development. This is destruction dressed in development’s language.
So I will say it plainly, and I will keep saying it: what is being done in Great Nicobar is one of the biggest scams and gravest crimes against this country’s natural and tribal heritage in our lifetime.
It must be stopped. And it can be stopped - if Indians choose to see what I have seen.
At 1:34-1:36 in this video there's this rare, endemic mammal sprinting away on a branch in the background. A Nicobar treeshrew! One of the species whose survival is at stake as @RahulGandhi points out.
Dr. Divya Mudappa - one of India’s finest ecologists now with the Nature Conservation Foundation - spotted it readily.
Insane that a man who hammered the daylights out of the Pak Air Force in a ground attack mission on Chaklala in '71 where he blew up the personal aircraft of the legendary Gen Chuck Yaeger (then advisor to Pak) is today asked to prove his identity in order to vote.
Just read this report by Jay Mazoomdaar.
Now, more than 90% of the Aravali Hills will not be counted as Aravalli any more and be potentially open to mining and construction with severe environmental ramifications, including the quality of air in Delhi-NCR.
The manner in which the Ministry of Environment came up with this disastrous definition of Aravalli Hills, to exclude 90% of them from environmental safeguards, in stark contrast to what the Forest Survey of India had recommended, then the manner in which the Central Empowered Committee, a creation of the Supreme Court, blessed it, and how ex-Chief Justice Gavai's bench sanctified this unholy proposal---all a telling example of how every institution connived to destroy the Aravalli for corporate misuse and to leave people of NCR-Delhi gasping for clean air!
This is among the most polluted days of the year - the AQI count above 600 in several areas, with the PM 2.5 count above 400 in many places. The air pollution map shows a dense spread of pollutants in the NCR - it thins out on Delhi's fringes. With the Supreme Court helpless, the state and central governments having failed entirely in resolving this mess, we are left with no hope but to pray for rains and for the pollution season to end. Real rains, not this artificial rain nonsense which too seems to have failed. @PMOIndia@gupta_rekha@myogiadityanath@BhagwantMann
@RailwayNorthern Hi can you give any info on a 2 hour parking spot at NDLS ajmeri gate? Thanks. Does the railway station have a parking facility at the moment? (not pick up/drop lane)
A few hundred metres from Gadaipur police chowki, people celebrate the toxic and nauseous air right now. So many crackers that I had ample time to take video @DelhiPolice kindly check @AtishiAAP@CAQM_Official
@VishnuNDTV@VishnuNDTV big fan, & appreciate your escalating the emergency, sadly normalised with us all. What is the way out? can you as a media leader move something forward.
@DelhiPolice Kindly attend to the insane noise from Primulas venue going on since 10 pm last night. By Police Chowki Gadaipur PS Fatehpur Beri. Nearby residents cannot sleep. That a service outpost is right outside the venue is clearly not helpful.
When my 77 year old Mom called this morning saying her eyes were stinging, I took a look at the air pollution levels in Greater Noida where she lives. It's worse than it was a few hours back - if this isn't an air-emergency, I don't know what is. @PMOIndia
@CMODelhi Madam, kindly attend to Mandi Road, Chattapur area, 110030. During sudden rain such as yesterday, the section near Jonapur is fully blocked by waist deep water making it non-usable. Dangerous & loss of life possible.
@anandmahindra sir could you offer these kolkata drivers who have served the country a genuine solution, maybe a new vehicle at a discount https://t.co/uSggV73E2R