Congress slams opposition parties for supporting Hazare

The Congress party has slammed the opposition for extending support to social activist Anna Hazare's crusade over the Lokpal Bill, even after it being tabled in Parliament.

Talking to reporters here, Congress party spokesperson Abhishek Manu Singhvi said political parties are exploiting the movement for their own benefit.

"Today, though it may seem temporarily expedient or politically advantageous for you (political parties), we ask you to consider the repercussions on democracy and the political process itself," said Singhvi.

He said that their (the Opposition) support to Hazare over the bill, which is now a property of the Parliament, is the ignorance of history and a humungous ignorance of the Constitutional process and law of the country.

Justifying the Delhi Police's act of arresting Hazare and his associates, Singhvi said: "If Delhi Police, of course in its wisdom, has imposed certain reasonable restrictions nobody is suggesting that I, you, Delhi Police or civil society is infallible; they are very wrong if anybody is aggrieved by any lack of reasonableness in any restriction, what is the only method known, it is to go to the only dispute redressal mechanism namely the courts."

Importance of Local issues in India

It is common knowledge today that waste material can help in power generation. Still, it is quite an irony that localities face a double whammy of power cuts and poor public hygiene (unseemly waste disposal), that too in a global city like Delhi.

Our society is always mismanaged. There are many issues that are specifically at local levels but are equally important at national level, for example, unscheduled power cuts. A power outage means a short or long term power loss to an area. These days such power outages are very frequent. There is no specific set time or schedule for power cuts in the society due to which people are suffering much.

Popular headlines read, “Delhi reels under long power cuts”, “Power cuts these days adding to people woes” but people are hardly in a position to make any good use of this information.

The erratic electricity supply creates a chaos among people especially when it’s scorching heat outside. People cannot relax even as diesel rate hikes dis-incentivise generator usage. It becomes very difficult for students to cope with such long power cuts and it hampers their studies.

No doubts though that consumption is increasing by the day. High usage of heavy electrical appliances and the soaring power demand under sultry conditions has aggravated the power woes.

Another major problem prevailing in our society is improper waste management. We can see dust bins clogged with garbage left in the open while the local authorities concerned are least bothered to take any steps. The foul smell apart, the main danger that comes with these open pits is the spread of diseases mainly caused by rodents and bugs. An example of this is malaria, which flourishes in open areas with stagnant water and particularly hot and muggy temperatures.

But luckily the advances in technology have led to many new discoveries. The enormous increase in the quantum and diversity of waste materials generated by human activity and their potentially harmful effects on the general environment and public health, have led to an increasing awareness about an urgent need to adopt scientific methods for safe disposal of wastage. While there is an obvious need to minimize the generation of wastes and to reuse and recycle them, the technologies for recovery of energy from wastes can play a vital role in mitigating the problems. Besides recovery of substantial energy, these technologies can lead to a substantial reduction in the overall waste quantities requiring final disposal, which can be better managed for safe disposal in a controlled manner while meeting the pollution control standard.

The bio gas plants are now gaining much popularity. A bio gas plant is the name often given to an anaerobic digester that treats farm wastes or energy crops. Bio gas is practically produced as landfill gas (LFG) or digester gas. A bio gas plant is the name often given to an anaerobic digester that treats farm wastes or energy crops.

Bio gas can be produced utilizing anaerobic digesters. These plants can be fed with energy crops such as maize silage or biodegradable wastes including sewage sludge and food waste.

Bio gas can be used to produce electricity on sewage works. The Deenabandhu Model is a new biogas-production model popular in India. The unit usually has a capacity of 2 to 3 cubic metres. It is constructed using bricks or Ferro cement mixture. In India the brick model costs slightly more than the Ferro cement model, however India’s Ministry of New and Renewable Energy offers some subsidy per model constructed.

Dispersants being used to Neutralise the Oil-Spill at Mumbai Coast

Dispersants have been used to neutralise the oil at Mumbai coast. Since Indian Coast Guard has been using dispersants to neutralise most of the oil patches to minimise the impact, only the left over oil will reach the coast. Regional Centre of National Institute of Oceanography, Mumbai is regularly collecting water samples to assess the impact of oil.

Oil Spill Modelling and trajectory prediction System of Integrated Coastal and Marine Area Management, (ICMAM) Project Directorate under the Ministry of Earth Sciences is used to generate likely trajectory scenarios for the prediction of movement of spilled oil, its spreading, direction, from sunken ship. Wind and Current are the primary factors responsible for spreading of oil.  Tidal current and winds predominantly drive the patches.

In the model tidal current generated by ICMAM PD using Mike 21 software and winds predicted by NCMWRF have been used.  In the model only oil from ship used and it does not account for Coast Guard intervention of using dispersants to neutralise the oil.  Model outputs indicated that coastal waters and beaches around Juhu, Thane creek and also Uran are likely to be affected by the oil spill, provided that no dispersant to neutralise the oil is used.

These information are provided to the Coast Guard time to time (since 7th Aug, 11) to combat the oil.  Coast Guard spotted oil patches 7-8 NM off Mumbai harbour on 8th Aug 11.  Most of the observed patches were found moving towards North West direction since 6 pm 8th Aug.11 which agrees with the model prediction. The situation of oil spill has changed now, since only 0.5 ton/hr spillage has been reported by the Coast Guard and oil is being neutralised.

It takes about 48 hrs for the untreated oil patches to reach the shore from the spill location.  This will be a continuous situation at the current rate of leakage and prevailing wind and current conditions.

The Indian Coast Guard (ICG) reported spillage of approx 1-2 tonnes/hr of Diesel oil on 7th Aug, 11 onwards. The Fuel oil tanks are said to be intact and no leakage reported.