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STATES:
DELHI
The
Big Foul-up
Violent
protests against a bid to shift polluting units leave the Government groping
for an alternative
By
Sayantan Chakravarty
Not
since the Anti-Mandal agitation over a decade ago has Delhi witnessed
a law and order problem of the scale that gripped the city last week.
On the streets bordering the cramped industrial pockets on both sides
of the Yamuna river, pitched battles were fought over closure of polluting
units. Every few minutes, policemen opened fire and lobbed tear-gas shells
to stop riotous situations from going out of control. Schools shut down.
Traffic jams stretched for miles and lasted several hours. Over 500 people
were rounded up for destroying and torching buses, railway engines, government
offices, even private cars and scooters. India were on the brink of victory
in a cricket Test at the Ferozeshah Kotla but the city's attention remained
focused on its streets.
 |
| Furious
over the closure drive, the mobs went berserk |
The agitators,
armed with soda bottles, bricks, canes and, of course, matchboxes, formed
a motley crowd, a random mix of embittered industrialists, their venom-spewing
minions and large groups of hired hoodlums. Together they held the governments,
both in Delhi and at the Centre, to ransom.
Away from
the war zones, political battles were being fought over the Supreme Court's
latest notice to the Delhi Government for non-compliance in shutting down
nearly one lakh polluting units functioning from residential areas in
Delhi. On November 14, the apex court had issued notices to the Delhi
chief secretary and the municipal commissioner asking them to explain
why the state Government had not complied with orders passed by the court
nearly four years ago. The court asked why the two "should not be
punished for contempt for the continued inaction on the part of the Delhi
Government in following orders beginning April 1996, and subsequent orders
till September 2000 regarding the closing down of polluting units in residential
areas of the city".
The "continued
inaction", it turns out, is that the Delhi government defied a series
of orders issued by the Supreme Court, following a public-interest litigation
(PIL) by Magsaysay awardee M.C. Mehta. In April 1996 the court had directed
the Delhi government to form a high-powered committee to shut down all
polluting industries in various residential pockets in Delhi, mostly in
the city's north-eastern, central and western areas, by January 1, 1997.
The court had said in the order that units allowed to run in residential
areas ought to be selected with care, keeping in mind the guidelines of
the Delhi Master Plan and the environmental needs of the localities.
Congress
Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, clearly unnerved by the court order and
the scale and tempo of the agitation, raced to and fro between the prime
minister's residence and her own, squabbled with bureaucrats, pacified
her partymen, and generally seemed at a loss on what course of action
to take. She wasn't alone. Six of the seven MPs from Delhi, all from the
BJP, too didn't know whether to blindly support the industrialists, and
their sizeable vote banks, or play along with the apex court order. The
seventh MP, Union Urban Development Minister Jagmohan, was of course at
the centre of the storm, though this one wasn't entirely of his making.
The minister as usual remained unruffled but his colleagues, worried by
the bizarre turn of events, rushed to the prime minister for succour.
Some like Madan Lal Khurana openly sided with the affected small-scale
industry owners. Khurana said in Parliament last week that "since
over one lakh small units would be hit, including several lakh workers,
the Master Plan of Delhi should be revised before shifting the industries".
Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee himself chose the middle-path, trying
to promise a way out by amending Delhi's Master Plan (due for changes
in 2001), and yet maintaining that the court's directions had to be complied
with.
The little
room left for discretion is where the doors to corruption may have opened.
Among the units allowed in residential areas are those that manufacture
incense sticks, assemble electronic goods, make carpets, caps, and turbans,
weave handlooms and zari items and house photostat machines. Using these
as a cover, the inspectors of various departments-including pollution
control, industries, electricity and municipality-allowed several highly
polluting units to run despite the stringent court orders. "There
is no doubt in my mind that the corrupt bureaucrats allowed polluting
industries to continue. Action should be initiated against them first.
There is no point in amending the Master Plan if we are not going to implement
rules in the first place. Officials must be made totally accountable,"
says Vijay Goel, one of the six Delhi MPs who met Vajpayee the past week.
Goel's apprehensions
may not be out of place. For, while reviewing the situation in October
1996, the apex court observed that the Delhi government had done a complete
volte-face. The court observed, "All along, the stand of the Delhi
government had been that all those industries which are not permitted
to operate in the city of Delhi were to be relocated. But in the affidavit
filed today (October 6, 1996), the government has shown its helplessness
in relocating/closing the industries which are illegally operating in
residential areas of Delhi." Later that month, the then chief secretary
Omesh Saigal filed an affidavit, saying that Delhi had nearly 5,000 acres
of land to relocate the industries within Delhi, and another 2,500 acres
in adjoining areas (in Uttar Pradesh and Haryana) which fell within the
National Capital Region. That land remains vacant even today.
So, where
did the problem of shifting the units lie? Evidently, within the administration.
Towards the end of March 1997, the court, dissatisfied with the progress,
made a scathing attack on the Delhi government. "It has taken it
quite some time to realise the importance of the matter and to get a grip
on it." Nearly four years and three court orders later, the situation
hasn't changed. Says Justice Kuldip Singh (retd), the Supreme Court judge
who passed the April 1996 order: "We had given enough time to the
government to act. But you can't wait indefinitely."
One man
who has waited for this day is Mehta. The lawyer-turned-environmentalist
believes that a few thousand displaced workers is a small price to pay
for a greener city where less lungs will choke because of smoke bellowing
from factories. Mehta had started it all some 15 years ago by filing a
petition in the Supreme Court. As riotous mobs roamed the streets of west
and north Delhi, the phone at Mehta's south Delhi residence never stopped
ringing, though only a few of the callers wanted to compliment him. Some
threatened to kidnap him, others said they would blow up his car. Says
Mehta: "The Government has collapsed. It is being held to ransom
by powerful vested interests who probably fund elections for our politicians.
The Delhi Master Plan is sacrosanct, a creation of Parliament. Why have
such a beautiful piece of legislation if we are never going to implement
the law?"
Implementing
the law is now the prime task before the state Government. A nonplussed
Dikshit knows that the only honourable exit from the mess is to promise
the industrialists "No Shutting Down" until the Master Plan
is amended. For that, of course, she is at the mercy of the Urban Development
Ministry (that controls the plan through the Delhi Development Authority),
and Jagmohan. Her bureaucrats, especially the ones at the receiving end
of the court notice like Municipal Commissioner S.P. Aggarwal (who has
to reply to the court on November 28) are taking no chances. Says Aggarwal,
whose initiative to close down polluting industries triggered the violence:
"There is no alternative. The orders are there to follow. There is
nothing higher than the Supreme Court."
While Aggarwal
is there to implement the law, a reluctant Jagmohan, who had a series
of meetings with Vajpayee, says he will consider amending the Master Plan.
In a statement he said "the present situation has arisen due to the
failure of the Delhi government to develop plots for relocation of industries
... (Our) Government is keen to find a solution ... we will amend the
Master Plan, if necessary ..."
As for the
rampaging mobs, they know that their time is running out. They can only
protest for some more time, then they will have to find alternative solutions
to make ends meet. Besides, the law is out in full measure to quell all
storms of protest in Delhi. Sadly for the protestors, colluding with government
officials has left them bitter losers in the end.
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