Lahaul & Spiti residents oppose power projects

Tribune News Service

Mandi, March 22

Lahaul and Spiti residents have urged the state government to not set up hydropower projects in the tribal district.

During the previous BJP governmemnt, power projects were proposed in Lahaul and Spiti. Now, the residents of the district are apprehensive that the Congress government may also plan to implement these projects to generate revenue and meet the growing demand for power.

Sonam Targe, a resident of the Spiti valley, says, “We will continue to raise our voice against blatant commodification and destruction of the Himalayan rivers. This district lies in the lap of the Himalayas. In the age of profit-making, it is alarming to see the rate at which rivers have been caged and tunnelled by large hydropower dams, mined for sand and dumped with chemicals and garbage.”

“Today ,there is hardly any river left in the Himalayas on which a hydropower project has not been built. The Sutlej now flows in tunnels and has been locked up into reservoirs. We, the residents of Lahaul and Spiti, are against the setting up of hydropower projects in this eco-fragile district, which falls under seismic zone-IV,” says Vikram Katoch, a resident of Lahaul.

They say setting up of power projects in the district may bring doom to them. “On the occasion of international campaign day for rivers, we have appealed to the state and Central governments to shun the plan to set up power projects in this eco-fragile district and let our rivers flow free,” says Targe and Katoch.

Lahaul and Spiti MLA Ravi Thakur had also raised the issue in the Vidhan Sabha last week.

“The district has witnessed frequent landslides in the past few years. It has also been observed that glaciers are melting rapidly in the region,” he says.

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