By IRA GAYATRI JHA
The Himalayan State of Uttarakhand is known widely for its scenic beauty, pleasant weather conditions and its historic Hindu pilgrimage sites. In the same capacity it is also almost always in the news for the repeated disasters that not only are responsible for hundreds of lives lost but also cause massive disruption in the machinery of the state itself.
During the last ten years of my active memory, I distinctly remember the Kedarnath flash floods in 2013, the glacial outburst of 2021 in Chamoli, the recent sinking of the Joshimath town, in addition to innumerable landslides that keep happening across the fragile terrain. The reasons as I read and understand are a mix of natural phenomenon propelled by the unsustainable man made interventions. Geological experts say that it is because of the unplanned cutting of these young fold mountains be it for roads, hydro-power projects or to bear the increased human population load. On the contrary, development protagonists say that it is just a natural phenomena and nothing else. The truth maybe lies in between, as causal correlations are difficult to establish but can’t be ruled out in totality.
Not just in Uttarakhand, concerns about the planet’s rising temperature leading to uncountable natural abnormalities have been discussed on multiple global forums. The world community has come together to devise solutions for the crisis but it is an uphill task, especially since a majority of the masses remain relatively unaware of the magnitude of the looming threat. This negligence on the behalf of not just the common person but also large corporate entities and organisations is perhaps the biggest hidden impetus to these disasters. Against this background, in my quest for finding answers to this problem, I read about the pathbreaking Environment, Social, Governance (ESG) framework that was officially coined in the United Nations’ Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI) report, called ‘Who cares, wins’. This was then included for the first time as a mandatory financial evaluation of companies and encouraged all business stakeholders to evaluate their work through the ESG lens.
Organisations were expected to examine how their business/works impacted the environment (E) with respect to energy use, waste, pollution, natural conservation, etc. The social (S) evaluation urged companies to see how their work impacted internal and external stakeholders, especially the local community, and lastly the governance (G) criterion talked about deploying ethical accounting methods and transparent leadership styles. The world has adopted ESG in a big way and ten countries including UK have mandatory ESG reporting and more than 90% S&P 500 Companies now publish ESG reports in some form.
While India has a robust Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) policy in place which mandates companies to engage in social welfare activities, in reality, our complex legal environment poses many challenges to these companies in terms of regulatory compliance, unprofessionalism and corruption. In order to mitigate and prevent current and future disasters, we must begin with making comprehensive ESG evaluation compulsory for companies that impact the environment adversely. That is perhaps one of the most important steps the government can take to save not just the lives of the citizens but also the already dying natural beauty and splendour of Uttarakhand.
(Ira Gayatri Jha is a Class XII student of St Joseph’s Academy, Dehradun)
