Ladakh Epicentre Of An Environmental Disaster - Sonam Wangchuk

The arid earthy brown hillscape enhanced the deep blue of the cloudless skies that topped them. This picturesque sight from Ladakh has often been shared by adventure tourists, high altitude bikers, and environmentalists.

The first two groups often highlight, on social media, the beauty of the land which many imagine mimics the lunar surface. The third has been trying to raise awareness on the vulnerability of the fragile mountain ecosystem.

However, their cries are yet to move those in political power, and those incharge of making infrastructural policies, including industrial and tourism related ones, which many locals say will hasten the ecological crisis. So, this group of Ladakhis are marching, all the way to Delhi, in the hope that the Union government listens to their demands this time. Ans before it is too late.

This long march to Delhi, however, has not created quite a media buzz yet. On Monday, September 9, environmental activist Sonam Wangchuk, hoped to correct that. He held an unusual press conference from Himalayan roads which the #SaveLadakh group is mapping on foot and peacefully marching to Delhi.

Speaking to The Citizen at the onset of the media interaction, Wangchuk said “this march is a month long and we are hoping to garner the people's support so the government listens. This march is not in the mainstream media yet, so we are not that visible.”

Wangchuk, who had made international headlines with his 21-day hunger strike earlier this year, told The Citizen that yet another protest fast is a possibility if the government continues to ignore their demands, and maybe even a legal path may be explored as a last resort. “If needed we will start a fast in Delhi on October 2. If needed as the last resort we will approach the courts. I hope it does not come to that,” Wangchuk said.

The long march is now close to the Ladakh-Himachal Pradesh border, and will reach western Himachal Pradesh in a couple of days.

The online press conference, held as soon as the group of around 75 people found stable internet service on the 9th day of the climate march, revealed weather-beaten faces but enthusiasm that was as strong as the cold winds blowing around them.

“This was one place where there is a military camp and some stop over for transportation here, trucks and so on. So we are happy to connect from here today,” Wanghuk said, adding, “we are in a very fragile ecosystem. that of the high Himalayas, which is facing impacts of climate change much faster and harder than the rest of the world. Therefore we started this march to underline the four-point agenda of the Leh Apex Body and Kargil Democratic Alliance, and for environmental safeguards as an environmentalist myself.

“Now our appeal is twofold, firstly, to the Prime Minister of India for fulfilling their promise to include Ladakh in the 6th schedule of the Constitution, which gives autonomy to the local indigenous people to manage this fragile area through their own public representatives.

“The Autonomous Council can make laws regarding the land, the forest culture, and so on. And these are the people that have taken stewardship of this place for thousands of years. Right now it is challenged by all kinds of environmental and industrial challenges, like corporates and industrial lobbies that can make it much faster and worse.

“The people are already facing the impact. So our first and more national or local appeal is for inclusion of Ladakh in the 6th Schedule for its safeguard. Secondly, our appeal is to the global citizens to cut down on emissions as fast as possible.”

Wangchuck warned that “We have less than five years left till it is irreversible and out of control, and because we are facing the brunt of climate change before others will also face. But we are already facing, you know, cloudbursts and droughts due to fast melting of our glaciers. So, we want to draw the urgent attention of the leaders of the world and people, citizens of the world.”

According to the environmentalist, what Ladakh is facing today will be faced by the surrounding regions as well. The high Himalayas, he said, were the “abode of most of the glaciers in the Hindu Kush Himalayas. If they melt fast we'll suffer first, but very soon the whole of North India and the whole of South China and Tibet will face huge problems of droughts and floods.”

The group says that so far they have been greeted warmly by the villages they passed. “People have come out to receive us, and to see us off, and to feed us along the way. So the support from the people has been tremendous” Wangchuck said.

According to him, “economic development has meaning only if it can sustain tomorrow. If in the name of development, we destroy, and we end up paying more than we get in mining or in industries, then it is not worth its while.

“So there should definitely be economic development. But it should be, what can sustain and what is in consultation with the local people right now there is no consultation forum whatsoever.

“We don't have an Assembly to send our voice or elected representatives. We don't yet have district councils that have lawmaking power where we send our elected representatives. We hope these five new districts are of the kind that have their, you know, lawmaking powers. But maybe not so.

One of the biggest solar power plants coming up in the region and Wangchuck says “the sad part is that it's being done without consultation of the local indigenous people, and therefore there'll be many mistakes”. He fears the intentional capturing of their pastures and says so far there is no forum for including the local people in this project.

“Tourism, if managed well, can be a huge [source of income]. There can be industry also of other kinds, but one the people here think of as manageable, not the kind that leaves the poisonous leftovers for the people to, you know, live with for generations, and industries make their profit, and people here pay for generations,” he said.

“We don't think that limitless cash and income is the answer to a happy, long sustained life in these mountains. Roughly, two billion people depend directly or indirectly on the glaciers of the Hindu Kush Himalayas for their water. That is most of North India and South China and Tibet.

“Roughly 50 Lakh in the Himalayas are directly dependent on this, and the rest indirectly. It's a huge scale of damage that we will have if we are blindly developing this for today's benefit alone.

“We hope it will reach the government. Through media like yours, it reaches a wide range of people who matter in a democracy, and even otherwise. You know we don't depend on whether the government will act or not. We are doing our part like the Gita says you do your action and fruits, you can leave,” he added.

When asked if the group wants to take legal recourse, as the Government has not even hinted at having a discussion with them, Wangchuk told The Citizen, that was a possibility but only as a last resort

“Courts are not really an answer. More public understanding and pressure on the government is what works once it is subjudice, then we can't even advocate our case as effectively. So we would like to build a popular, you know, strong pressure on the government, and I'm sure sooner or later they will pay heed to their own interest.

“It is a promise they have made themselves. It has made them lose one election. It will damage them more, and we don't want to have any such effects. We only want them to remember what they had promised in 2019 Parliament elections, 2020 Hill Council elections. So we'll continue to do that. And we'll continue to make citizens in the country aware about it before taking any legal recourse.

“The glaciers are melting away and giving us flash floods and droughts alternatingly. So we are at the forefront of impacts of climate change, and therefore we appeal, secondly, to the global population, especially those in the big cities to cut down on emissions as urgently as possible and adopt simpler lifestyles.

“So this is the background in which this long climate march is taking place and will be reaching New Delhi on second October, the birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi, because this movement is, and its ways are, inspired by Mahatma Gandhi. The long march like this Padyatra and fasts like we have been doing, and therefore, on second October will be New Delhi to make a global appeal to the world leaders, and particularly our own Prime minister for safeguards of the environment, culture, and people of Ladakh, and dealing with the impacts of climate change which are felt severely in these mountains.

On the lack of media attention towards this long march, Wangchuck remained demure, saying “Well, we didn't do much to, you know spread it out in the media so far. It's a month long thing, and we have to have done something before we are there. We have been walking, and we hope that it will reach people and the government when the time comes.

“This is a march to Delhi, at the end of which we'll be in Delhi on October 2, at Rajghat, and if needed, we'll start an anshan or a fast there.But we hope we don't need to do that if needed.”

When asked if anyone from the Government approached him, Wangchuck said, “The earlier padyatras or marches were to the borders of Ladakh, which involved military issues, and so on. That was about how our herders are losing their pasture land, and since it involved sensitive border areas it was taken seriously by the government not to allow people there.

“It is a matter of, you know, concern for national importance. So we cancelled that at that time when it overreacted with section 144, and so on. Now this march is a simple march, you know within the country, and not involving any borders. So we hope to go to Delhi, and that should not have any such implications.”

The apex body had announced the long march plans on August 24, and the Union Home Ministry announced the formation of five new districts on August 26. “We can say that it has an indirect effect on the Government. Though not exactly fulfilling what the people are demanding. Now these 5 districts could be, you know, as per the 6th Schedule” he claimed.

However, he added that the people still do not know if these districts will have autonomous councils, with elected representatives of indigenous tribal people. “We don't know. There's very little information on what kind of districts” he added, avering to the “U-turn” by the government in the past.

“There has been no call for continuing the discussion. The least people here can ask is, continue the dialogues, peaceful dialogues which their own minutes say that these dialogues will go on, but now it is nearly four months after the elections, and there is no response, no call for meeting, and therefore we are trying to invite or attract their attention,” he said.

The group is now marching to Delhi walking around 40 kilometres a day. “We have basic medical facilities. No doctors, and the government/ UT administration has not provided any sort of help,” Wangchuck said.

He is also planning to launch a campaign to write postcards to the national leaders to bring their attention to the cause. “We don't expect that it will be solved right in one march. Things take long and lower the expectation longer we can sustain. So one is to expect people

to support, and finally, it makes the government respond,” he said.

So far Satpal Malik the former Governor of Jammu Kashmir has been the most prominent ‘political’ name and extended his support to this. Answering a question on this Wangchuck said “Satpal Malikji has been a very staunch supporter, and concerned about issues in Ladakh. I remember when I met him last in Srinagar. He had said that the issue of district status was already done, and it is only to announce it. But after that things changed, he got moved.”