Should we protest the Methane (CBM) project

Should we stop the ongoing Coal Bed Methane (CBM) projects at the Tanjore Delta of Tamilnadu? Are the allegations such as the “project may the spoil environment and take away the livelihood of farmers around”, is this true? How far it is justifiable ?

I read a bit about the whole process. Let me share what I learnt, then you can answer the above questions yourselves!.

HOW DOES CBM WORK :

Naturally formed Methane in the underground coal marcels will get released when they are de-pressurized. CBM companies drill deep wells into these coal beds and pumping out all the surrounding water, so that the coal seal gets de-pressurized and lets out the methane to flow as a gas up through the pipes. Methane is then compressed and commercialized into market. It is often also necessary to stimulate the coal seam via fracking (process of fracturing the solid ground layers with high pressure chemicals/liquids) in order to maximum extract of gas.

SO WHAT ARE THE IMPACTS:

Ground Water depletion
Continuously removaing water from coal beds depletes ground water and may eventually lower farmer’s boreholes and underground waterlevel. It can also change the flow of good fresh groundwater to into the coal seams.

Waste Water Disposal
Millions of litres of produced water have to be disposed of from each well. Over time this represents a massive volume of water and toxic material released into rivers, estuaries and the sea.

Leaking Wells & Drinking water contamination
The steel and concrete pipes plunged deep into the ground will decay slowly over time. All gas wells will leak eventually. The possibility of the water used in fracking to contaminate water in rivers and other bodies of water is pretty high.

Air & Noise Pollution & Infrastructure damage
Road damage is an inevitable consequence of methane exploration due to intensive transportation of materials and machinery.

Global Warming & Earth Quakes
CBM is not green, it is not the replacement for traditional fossil fuels, it’s just another energy extraction technique, thus we ‘re only keep expanding the hydrocarbon and emissions. We’re already witnessing the bad effects interms of global warming and frequent earth quakes.

WHAT IS MY VIEW:
I do support technology and development; but this one is not required for our country - where there's already a huge water scarcity; poor infrastructure, corrupted environment/safety regulatory bodies, and greedy business men backed by fraud politicians. Why should we risk the livelihood of our future generations for the profits of certain corporates ?

In the end, I just can’t imagine the beautiful green surrounding of Cauvery delta region turning into a dark coal dump; pure breeze of air to go polluted with chemicals and dangerous gases; chirping sounds of sparrows to change into blasting bore well bombs and restless truck noises; and finally the poor people of these region will loose all they have got and become the refugee of their own land😢 #SaveNeduvasal #banhydrocarbonproject #savefarmer #saveagriculture

Stop Child Trafficking & Child Abuse

I feel so powerless, hopeless and shameful when I hear terrible news like #Hasini, a 7-year-old Chennai girl who was molested and murdered by her neighbor. What kind of society we are living in? How can an educated youth commit such a brutal act?

Hasini is not the only victim, we keep hearing child trafficking and abuse cases almost everyday. The child crime rates and statistics are rocketing now more than ever, almost one in every two kid India is going thru' some sort of abuse.

WHY? Why do these horrible abuse and hurt continue? There’s not a single reason to cut-it down right away, there are many factors: the abuser's bad childhood, lack of (sex) education, loneliness, poverty, family issues, ...in some cases poor parenting and parent themselves.

Children in India are often very dependent on their parents and elders; they continue to have submissive and obedient roles towards all the elders, which makes them an easy prey. In most of the cases, the abuser is always a trusted neighbour, relative or even the parent., and that’s the reason for most these crimes go unreported too.

The message I’m trying to convey here is: Let’s do something about these non-senses. Let’s create awareness and try to educate at-least one parent by telling them the importance of their role and about the frightening issues our kids facing everyday (not to scare, but to inform them!)

Children are innocent, hence they become the most vulnerable part of our society. Their innocence needs to be protected. We, as a Society, have a bigger duty of protecting our future generation, make and lead them to a better society to live-in.

Our Children are the future. If their lives are at risk, then such a society will not be able to suffice longer. #Childabuse  , #notochildabuse #childkidnapping#childtrafficking#childsafety #india

Indian Budget and Increasing Inequality

I am not qualified to review or even to fully-understand one of the biggest budgets of the world. However, as a common man with a common sense, I do have a concern and asking fellow Indians to think about it.

A recent report published by Credit Suisse says, India's rich people are getting richer every year, as the top 1% of them now own 58.4% of entire India’s wealth. For instance in the year 2000 , the share of the richest 1% was comparatively low, 36.8% of the country’s wealth. The trend of “rich getting richer” has been growing multifold for the last 16 years and the rest 99% of the people doesn’t make any significant progress. What do you think is the reason ?

This only shows that rich class do so well for themselves whichever government is in power, doesn't matter #UPA or #NDA, the rich industrialists control most of the assets of whole country and government policies are only to favour them. 

In many ways this year’s Budget may have a number of new features., but it is no different in neglecting the serious issue of economic “inequality”.

The informal sector of our economy contributes nearly half of our GDP and employs nearly 70% of our working people. This sector was worst hit by demonetization and continues to remain crippled; but there’s no mention about revival of demonetization effects in the budget. 

There is not a single word on recovering the massive NPAs (non-performing assets of banks), though the budget says, the government would act*(mean?) against those have fled abroad.

On the other hand, all the industrialists celebrate the budget; SENSEX & NIFTY surges into green. These only give an impression that this year budget is also only to woo the rich and doesn’t have any interest to address the issues of poor.

SO WHAT IS THE POINT:

Everyone of us want #GDP growth, But remember, the overt focus on GDP at the cost of compromising other social factors is dangerous. Policy making, such as budget should not get biased for the large corporates, while leaving out the primary concerns of the larger public.

When policy making gets biased for the rich, roads will be designed only for cars, not for the pedestrians. Taxation scheme will aid only the industrialists, not the salaried middle/under class of India. When primary sectors such as Health, Education, and Infrastructure are owned by private rich industrialist, these basic amenities will become accessible only for the people who can pay for it.

India of our dreams cannot be built on weak foundation of huge economic disparity. Let’s think beyond our “individual tax slab”announcements in the budget and urge the government for sincere reforms that redistribute the wealth and level the opportunities.

Let’s spread the awareness within us and impel our policy makers towards the “real” growth of country, in terms of proper health, good education, and impartial access to opportunities to everyone, this can only be the long-term solution.

Meet "Balaknama" - The World's First Newspaper run by Street Children

I just came to know about “Balaknama” - A Newspaper run by the Delhi Street Children, which focuses on the lives and struggles of street kids.

The name says it all - Balaknama translates to “Voice of Children”; it’s an effort from a bunch of street children sharing great passion to write and reach the crowd. It’s my shame that I didn’t know about this newspaper so far, which has been in circulation since 2003. Happy that I came to know at least by now and I thought I should share it with you all.

Delhi's slum kids are one of the most abandoned people of India. Child marriage, Forced Child labor, begging, drug, sexual abuse, police violence are some of the bad tribulations these street children battle everyday L. Thanks to the efforts of CHETNA ( NGO), now these kids have turned into amateur journalists and reporters who write articles about the struggles of being slum kids and feature them in their newspaper.

Balaknama has a team of 60 reporters, most of them are based in the slums of Delhi and near-by states of Madhya Pradesh, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh. These young writers gets some basic training on story telling and composing articles from Chetna. Most of these children are working on odd jobs during the day to earn for their food, and later in the evening they spend their time to write for the newspaper.

This is a truly inspiring, these children are striving hard to bring their pressing issues into limelight, while empowering themselves through this newspaper. Good efforts like these should definitely be appreciated and supported.  #balaknama #delhi #streetkids #chetna

Please see the video to know more: