By Ali Abbas:
Greenpeace India The organization works on global issues of utmost importance like climate change and global warming, chemical free agriculture, saving our last remaining forests, defending ocean and stopping yet another nuclear disaster. It promotes renewable energy and community driven solutions.
India is experiencing a new wind of change. Development seems to be the word of the moment. Many people are in the illusion that PM Modi will wave his magic wand and in the next few years we will be transformed as a nation at par with USA and the European countries.
Ever since the new government was formed, development has become synonymous to nationalism and whosoever questions the real cost and beneficiaries of development is being viewed as less national. In some cases even anti-national and a threat to the economic security of the country. One such organization which is highlighted profoundly in the report for the loss of GDP is Greenpeace India.
The author had volunteered the Greenpeace India.......these are his views
More than an organization, Greenpeace is a movement, which believes in people before profit. It promotes the idea of sustainable development with equal concerns for nature, wildlife and people.
Its work is backed
by concrete scientific research and promotes meaningful alternative
solutions.
Ever since Greenpeace India started campaigning in 2001, it registered its first major victory in 2004 when Supreme Court’s monitoring committee on hazardous waste fined Hindustan Liver Limited (HLL) with 50 crore for damages caused to environment by its mercury thermometer factory plant in Kodaikanal. HLL was also asked to set up health clinics for people to recover from the effects of mercury poisoning.
To promote energy efficiency in the country, Greenpeace ran a campaign called “Ban the Bulb” in 2006. Massive awareness efforts were made to let people know about energy efficiency and to replace incandescent bulb with CFLs to reduce energy consumption. After three years of campaigning, the government launched “Bachat Lamp Yojana” by subsidising CFLs for the general public hence saving energy.
Standing alongside farmers and their rights, Greenpeace has been campaigning against the controversial and MNC controlled Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs). Greenpeace India brought the debate into public sphere by highlighting scientific evidences and examples from other countries. In the year 2010 after several rounds of public consultations, the then Environment Minister, Jairam Ramesh put the commercialisation of BT Brinjal on an indefinite moratorium.
Apart from these, regular efforts were made to expose environmental crimes in the country and Greenpeace lobbied for rules that favour protection and preservation of environment by demanding polluters pay policy.
What makes Greenpeace’s voice stronger in India or elsewhere is its financial independence. Greenpeace never accepts funding from governments, political parties or corporates. All its donations are carefully scrutinized and its balance sheet is uploaded on the website every year. Its funding sources are public. All its funds are received via bank transactions hence making it transparent, unlike political parties whose funding sources are not known.
The only people to be threatened by Greenpeace campaigning are the greedy corporates, for whom maximization of profit means everything and care for the environment means nothing. For those intelligent people, a proverb says, when the last tree is cut, when the last river is poisoned, when the last fish is dead, we will realize that we can’t eat money.
About the author: Ali Abbas is an environment activist in India.
Although the article is written by Ali Abbas ....but my views do copy
Greenpeace India The organization works on global issues of utmost importance like climate change and global warming, chemical free agriculture, saving our last remaining forests, defending ocean and stopping yet another nuclear disaster. It promotes renewable energy and community driven solutions.
India is experiencing a new wind of change. Development seems to be the word of the moment. Many people are in the illusion that PM Modi will wave his magic wand and in the next few years we will be transformed as a nation at par with USA and the European countries.
Ever since the new government was formed, development has become synonymous to nationalism and whosoever questions the real cost and beneficiaries of development is being viewed as less national. In some cases even anti-national and a threat to the economic security of the country. One such organization which is highlighted profoundly in the report for the loss of GDP is Greenpeace India.
The author had volunteered the Greenpeace India.......these are his views
More than an organization, Greenpeace is a movement, which believes in people before profit. It promotes the idea of sustainable development with equal concerns for nature, wildlife and people.
Its work is backed
by concrete scientific research and promotes meaningful alternative
solutions.Ever since Greenpeace India started campaigning in 2001, it registered its first major victory in 2004 when Supreme Court’s monitoring committee on hazardous waste fined Hindustan Liver Limited (HLL) with 50 crore for damages caused to environment by its mercury thermometer factory plant in Kodaikanal. HLL was also asked to set up health clinics for people to recover from the effects of mercury poisoning.
To promote energy efficiency in the country, Greenpeace ran a campaign called “Ban the Bulb” in 2006. Massive awareness efforts were made to let people know about energy efficiency and to replace incandescent bulb with CFLs to reduce energy consumption. After three years of campaigning, the government launched “Bachat Lamp Yojana” by subsidising CFLs for the general public hence saving energy.
Standing alongside farmers and their rights, Greenpeace has been campaigning against the controversial and MNC controlled Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs). Greenpeace India brought the debate into public sphere by highlighting scientific evidences and examples from other countries. In the year 2010 after several rounds of public consultations, the then Environment Minister, Jairam Ramesh put the commercialisation of BT Brinjal on an indefinite moratorium.
Apart from these, regular efforts were made to expose environmental crimes in the country and Greenpeace lobbied for rules that favour protection and preservation of environment by demanding polluters pay policy.
What makes Greenpeace’s voice stronger in India or elsewhere is its financial independence. Greenpeace never accepts funding from governments, political parties or corporates. All its donations are carefully scrutinized and its balance sheet is uploaded on the website every year. Its funding sources are public. All its funds are received via bank transactions hence making it transparent, unlike political parties whose funding sources are not known.
The only people to be threatened by Greenpeace campaigning are the greedy corporates, for whom maximization of profit means everything and care for the environment means nothing. For those intelligent people, a proverb says, when the last tree is cut, when the last river is poisoned, when the last fish is dead, we will realize that we can’t eat money.
About the author: Ali Abbas is an environment activist in India.
Although the article is written by Ali Abbas ....but my views do copy
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