PUNE: The government on Friday increased the budgetary allocation for the Environment Ministry from Rs 2,586.67 crore to Rs 3,111.20 crore, which has been welcomed by the environmentalists from the city.
However, they rue that inclusion of few ‘green’ measures does not mean it is a green budget. Apparently, Prime Minister Modi had called the budget as ‘Green Budget’. Renowned environmentalist Madhav Gadgil said, “Increase in the budgetary provision does not ensure the protection and conservation of the environment. Umpteen times budgetary allocations are made to the Environment Ministry, but these allocations are used by the bureaucracy.”
“All we need is the strict implementation of the measures, which were decreasing day by day. The government blatantly ignores the environment assessment reports presented by the green activists,” Gadgil added.
“The pollution control board too did not work honestly. The government should ensure law enforcement rather than just making the budgetary provisions,” he further said.
Savitribai Phule Pune University environment students lecturer and researcher Rohit Bhagwat said, “It’s kind of a mixed budget. The positive points were subsidising loan for electric cars, the continuation of Swachh Bharat Abhiyan besides making provisions for Solid Waste Management, increase in the renewable energy budget from Rs 10,000 crore to Rs 12,000 crore.”
“But there are many negative points like no allocation of funds for fighting the global climate change even after signing of the Paris Agreement. Similarly, not even the provision of a generation of funds to fight air and water pollution,” said Bhagwat.
He also said that there was no mention of Research and Development (R&D). “With no conservation and protection policy in place, the green budget has no meaning,” Bhagwat added.
Ornithologist Dharmaraj Patil said, “Though the inclusion of zero budget farming and a push for electric vehicles can be called as green parts in the entire budget that is presented today. But the whole concept of a green economy is far from the understanding of the present government.”
The very first expectation from the government was to invest in the protection of rich ecosystems right from forests, grasslands, scrublands to rivers, marine and mangroves. “While all these ecosystems are rapidly being encroached and polluted in the name of infrastructural and industrial developments, there is no point in talking of just e-cars,” Patil said.
Patil added, “Government also sees rampant plantation drives as the only solution. Only the ecosystemic conservation approach can bring the desired change. Many wild species in India are on the verge of extinction. Budget allocation to their ecosystem’s conservation is the need of the time”.
