As India grapples with weather extremes, the country must use an inclusive lens in its climate action plans and strategies to protect some of the most vulnerable groups from the impact of fickle weather, environmental scientist Dr. Rakesh Kumar tells The Migration Story
Mansi Bhaktwani
Picture credit: Prashant Nakwe
Mumbai: The year 2024 was the hottest on record. The impact of the deadly heatwaves that swept through large swathes of India was mostly felt by the country’s poorest, many of them migrant workers living rough in cities. Their problems were further compounded by the dip in the air quality in the winter - not only were they most exposed to toxic air, but mitigation efforts such as restrictions on construction activity hit their daily earnings.
Cities need to be more mindful of vulnerable groups in their planning of climate solutions, said environmental scientist Dr. Rakesh Kumar, who is the former director of Council of Scientific and Industrial Research & National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (CSIR-NEERI). Dr Kumar’s work spans carbon capture, climate policy, and health and he spoke to The Migration Story on a wide range of challenges - from air pollution to planning infrastructure in cities better.
Excerpts from an interview:
Q. Several major Indian cities are grappling with poor quality. How do you think that can be tackled?
A. Air pollution isn't just a problem for megacities like Mumbai and Delhi; smaller towns often face even worse conditions. While big cities have the resources and knowledge to tackle pollution, smaller cities lack these capabilities.
A common response is to increase monitoring, but the focus should instead be on implementing effective technologies and processes. In construction, for example, there are multiple sub-processes - material transfer, different kinds of material, demolition, breakage of things, then you build certain things, then you again demolish - which contribute to pollution. So merely putting green cloth doesn't solve your problem. You are addressing part of the problem, not the complete problem.
Another difficult sector, I would say is vehicles. Indian vehicles largely comply with global emission standards, but vehicle pollution still remains a problem. The reason is that you are not able to move vehicles as smoothly. So, if your vehicle, even if it's BS 6, is not able to give you more than 4 to 6 kilometres per litre, then you are creating more pollution.
The mere implementation of technology in vehicles is not going to solve your air pollution.
You need to look at how your vehicle's road conditions are, your signals, and public transportation because your job of design and implementation is not to move vehicles from point A to B, but to move people. So, the current design paradigm is you want to transport 200 vehicles from point A to B, whereas your plan should be, how do I transport 2000 people from A to B? And for that, what is needed? And that's where the planning and concepts are going, I would say.
Q. The impact of breathing poor air is not the same for everyone. Or is it?
A. The poor cannot fight it while others can possibly think of doing something. Now the air pollution in Delhi is very high, some may choose to move out temporarily, and some permanently. Those who have livelihood issues cannot move out as such. The immediate priority is building infrastructure that addresses their urgent needs.
When extreme events occur the poor must get water, shelter and sanitation but it doesn’t happen.
That infrastructure needs a lot of strengthening. Also, health. Our hospitals and our doctors, the whole sector has not been made fully aware about climate change related health issues, which happens post extreme weather events and otherwise also, which results in multiple health issues.
Q. How do we make solutions to cope with new risks affordable to all?
A. Urban designing plays a crucial role, which currently may not provide necessary solutions as extreme weather events such as heat and floods go up. Also, extreme urbanization accelerates rainwater flow, leading to floods even in previously unaffected areas.
Those with the affordability of air conditioning to cope with the heat may struggle in the future as heat from surrounding buildings increases. And the flooding situation of cities would remain unchanged until we incorporate in our urban design more space to soak the rainwater for a longer period, holding it for some time and releasing it slowly.
Besides, urban design gets discussed quite a bit but in the context of major cities such as Chennai, Bangalore, Mumbai, Delhi. But what happens to Satara, Nagpur, Indore? Policies being made at the national level must percolate to states, districts and local governments, which is not happening currently.
While the United Nations has developed a framework for climate-resilient cities, it now needs to be tailored to the unique needs of each city.
The coastal cities, vulnerable cities, and smaller cities will have a different framework, all require customization at the local level.
In resilient city design, people's participation is key. Residents should provide insights based on their experiences from the past and their expectations for the future. However, this often doesn’t happen in practice.
It is important to understand that the design of urban centres, which used to be on the basis of parameters such as the average derived from 50 years of rain or 25 years of rain, needs to be relooked at..
Whether tackling heat or floods, urban design comes into the picture, that you are not designing housing, or your cities, correctly. We need to make forests in fringe areas more greener, more denser.
Q. How and what can be done better to be better equipped to cope with a climate-vulnerable future?
What's important here is the concept of environmental justice. For example, when driving a car, I occupy 25 to 35 square meters, whereas someone travelling on a bus occupies less than one square meter.
Have we ensured that public space is allocated equitably to everyone? When this is addressed, the planning process will incorporate these costs, leading to a more balanced flow of funds, allowing for effective implementation of necessary changes.
Also, environmental degradation must be included in the real GDP calculation, and funds must be allocated accordingly to address these challenges
We worry more about immediate concerns. For instance, if water is unavailable today, it causes immediate concern. However, the long-term absence of water over 10-15 years due to climate change often goes unnoticed. To address this, conversion of these concerns into communication packages saying, you’ll lose money, jobs etc, is required.
We need macro planning at the country level and state level. But we need to translate them at the micro level for the actual action to happen. If I say that, the whole of NCR will get flooded, that's not useful information. It is important that I say which location will be flooded, where is it going to rain more.
And then I will start looking at my infrastructure, where are my bridges, where are my hospitals, and where are my sensitive locations and start planning for that. So, I would say a bigger picture is important. But smaller picture and scale-down models are important for actual action… better preparedness for environmental protection. So, sectoral technologies and processes are there.
For each of these, we require a lot of work. It is not enough to have the technology, but its application. Sometimes technology can be there, but it will probably not solve the problem. So, scaling of the technology and its verification and validation is something which India will have to do more and more. We will have to allow some technologies to be applied and wait for their failure. If at all it has to fail. Because unless and until you apply them, unless and until you check them, you don't know which one is likely to work. You can still use all your intelligence, but you are likely to fail. So, India needs to do this more work in terms of application.
It's important that we make a plan, which is easy to again change a little bit. It should not be cast in stone. But this is what I think will solve the problem.
 “MY VILLAGE’S AIR QUALITY IS POORER THAN MUMBAI’S” Sandeep Kumar moved from his village in Haryana to Mumbai 10 years ago in search of employment opportunities. Kumar works as a sweeper in Thane and began considering Mumbai his home. But the dipping air quality has him worried now. “I start working early in the morning around 5 am, when the air is breathable and the weather is pleasant. I am worried for my child’s health and we reside near a construction site,” said Kumar while cleaning a residential street. He doesn't wish to return to his hometown, as it is located in a region where stubble burning is blamed for contributing to pollution in the neighbouring state of Delhi. Thane/Mumbai, by comparison, has better air quality, he said. |  “I AM WORRIED ABOUT MY CHILD’S HEALTH” For insurance agent Suchita Verma, 28, her two-wheeler is her lifeline, as she uses it to commute for work and to run errands. But in recent weeks, the Thane resident has been struggling to breathe when she rides her vehicle, from bouts of cough and dry throat, much like the rest of her family including her five-year-old child and elderly parents. “I am worried about my child’s health. She had a cough and fever, and now we have fallen ill. The doctor has prescribed the medication,” she said, trying to make her child comfortably sit on her two-wheeler outside the school premises. |  “I HAVE LEFT MY WELLBEING TO GOD” Omprakash Yadav, a 60-year-old auto driver originally from Jaunpur, Uttar Pradesh, has been living in Mumbai for the past 40 years. Now living alone, he takes his health lightly despite worsening conditions of air quality. “Sab bhagwan bharose chal raha hai (Everything runs by God’s grace),” he says. “I don’t use a face mask now—only wore one during the lockdown. I spend all day on the road, and pollution from buses, rickshaws, and other vehicles has only increased. But I maintain my auto rickshaw.” |
Mansi Bhaktwani is a journalist with The Migration Story
