Vivek Menezes
Goa dodged a bullet when the year’s first Meteorological Department red alerts about extreme monsoon weather (and possible cyclone) didn’t come true this weekend. The damage from two days previous downpour was bad enough, and if those conditions had continued it would have been outright disaster. After an entire decade of unchecked environmental destruction – and its age-old climate resiliency – the writing is very clearly on the wall for India’s smallest state.
Renowned ecologist Madhav Gadgil warned us very directly in 2018, after floods in Kerala killed hundreds of people: “Of course, the Western Ghats are not as high in Goa as they are in Kerala, but I am sure Goa will also experience all sorts of problems. The greed for enormous profits has been allowed to go on unchecked, which has actually worsened economic disparity in the society. So now those who are making money through these means are even more effective in getting the government to allow this kind of rampant illegal behaviour. The central government is actually bending over backwards to make sure the National Green Tribunal does not function properly. On the sadas [plateaus] of Goa there are a lot of streams originating but they don’t mention about them in their EIA reports. All kind of false statements are made in these reports.”
As we all know, and have been painfully forced to endure, the holocaust of trees in Goa only multiplied after 2018, and accelerated even further after Covid: fields filled, orchards levelled, entire hillsides turned to mud. The results have been devastating on multiple fronts – air quality remains poor all year round, village communities are swamped far past any carrying capacity, and Goans are almost completely priced out of their own ancestral turf. Now, after the monsoon decided to arrive early, we are seeing another huge problem caused by all this unholy greed – and the fake Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) reports - that Gadgil mentions.
Much of the new real estate and “infrastructure” development is vulnerable to landslides and flooding, which is going to cause much suffering but should surprise precisely no one. Gadgil predicted it. Goa Foundation predicted it. Everything that is happening now – and will continue to happen – was predicted in full before, during and after the incredibly irresponsible orgy of illegalities that now characterises the state’s reputation.
“Siltation of rivers due to surface soil erosion and mudslides is common in high rainfall areas with lateritic soils,” says Miguel Braganza, the esteemed horticulturalist and mentor to two generations of agriculturalists, who has served as Secretary of the excellent Botanical Society of Goa for 15 of its 35 years in existence: “I have seen it recently during a holiday in Madeira, an island off the mainland Portugal, where hillsides are being terraced to extend the vineyards. Ironically, it was the Portuguese who brought the cashew - anacardium occidentale - seeds from Brazil to Goa, germinated them and raised the trees purely for control of soil erosion. These cashew trees have a unique root system that binds the soil together, and, actually, cutting them down, or creating “accidental” fires to burn them down for “development” is not exactly new.
The people in Sattari, Sanguem and Canacona did it earlier for ‘Kumeri’ - slash and burn cultivation - but the practice became prohibited in Goa during colonial rule, which is why we have good tree cover in the foothills of the Western Ghats.”
Braganza told me “last year, we have experienced the effect of cutting of cashew trees and paving of the plateau for the Mopa Airport. All the water that would have normally seeped into the ground simply flowed into the villages below, and flooded the roads, including the NH-66. It was expected, because even the open-cast iron ore mines need to have ‘tailing ponds’ for run-off of monsoon rains, but no such regulation was applied in Goa for the airport, or all the industrial estates, and other developments on the plateaus. Also, the cutting of mangroves – or sometimes slow death by reducing water flows as in Merces – is another major cause for concern. As it is, many bunds (or dykes) of the khazan networks have been breached or washed away because the traditional system was replaced by a legal framework that just does not work. The issue is urgent but Newton's Law of Motion applies to an average Goan [and only] a people's movement can change things for the better.”
World Wide Fund for Nature – India’s state coordinator Aditya Kakodkar told me that “climate-driven calamities such as unseasonal rain and the resulting flooding and landslides will get more frequent. The problem will get worse as time passes, and if no action is taken to address it. That is why citizens should stay vigilant about issues such as encroachment of natural drainage, of landfilling in low-lying areas as well as hill-cutting in their villages, and make sure that such instances are reported to relevant authorities. In most flooding or landslide situations, citizens are often the first responders. Hence, each village could have a designated group of individuals who would be trained in first aid and rescue swimming etc. to save lives.”
Kakodkar says “the recent flooding and mudslides are mainly due to removing of tree cover and hill-cutting, which has caused large amount of topsoil to wash off into the water channels, thereby reducing their capacity to carry water, which eventually caused flooding of low-lying areas. Knowing this, designated water drainages should be monitored throughout the year for siltation and encroachment, and storm water channels should be maintained on a priority basis before monsoon, while construction in low lying flood plains should be entirely prohibited. Goa can learn a lot from Malaysia which has a similar tropical climate as well as similar flooding risks. Community based flood mitigation strategies have worked wonders there, where community members are involved in designing flood management plans and traditional knowledge about disaster management is given utmost importance.”
(Vivek Menezes is a writer and co-founder of the Goa Arts and Literature
Festival)