India and Brazil - Comparing Environmental Policies in 16 Countries - page 167

people fled. Even worse, religious riots erupted as adherents of one religion
attacked their former neighbors. Half a million were killed. Later, in 1974,
tension developed between East and West Pakistan, leading to a revolt by
those in the east. India favored them and assisted with troops. The eastern
portion became the new country of Bangladesh.
India suffers from many environmental problems. The rapid population
growth has overtaxed its resources. Poverty is intense. Water is not drink-
able in many rural villages or city slums. Raw sewage and agricultural
pesticides pollute the rivers. Air pollution comes from factories and auto-
mobiles. Coal-fired electric generating plants are inefficient. Forests are
being cut down, and deserts are spreading.
The worst single tragedy occurred at the Union Carbide pesticide
factory in Bhopal in 1984, when 40 tons of poison gas spilled out. With
safety systems either malfunctioning or turned off, the fatal cloud soon
dispersed over a city of half a million. In the first 3 days, 8,000 people died,
mainly from cardiac and respiratory arrest. Eventually over 20,000 people
died from the gas, and 120,000 became chronically ill. Tragic as the case
may be, it is not really an environmental event, but an industrial acci-
dent caused by a malfunction at a factory. As such it is more like a coal
mine accident. Typically, environmental pollution occurs over a long time
and in small quantities. Air pollution, for example, is a continuing release
of small amounts of chemicals from the routine production of a factory
or driving a motor vehicle. The means to control air pollution are quite
different from the means to avoid industrial accidents.
India also suffers from the environmental problems of its neighbor
Bangladesh. Overpopulation and lack of farmland force migration of poor
people seeking land and jobs. Due to its extremely low elevation above
sea level, Bangladesh is often flooded, and with the prospect of global
warming the future holds more danger. India makes legal immigration
nearly impossible. In recent years it has been building a barbed wire fence
three meters high to keep the Bangladeshis out. The wall extends nearly
3,000 kilometers along the shared border.
The threat of global warming is vague and in the distant future,
hence India paid little attention. This changed briefly in 2002 when the
annual Conference of the Parties for the Kyoto Protocol was scheduled
for New Delhi. Playing host stimulated Indian scientists and officials to
mobilize, which they would not have done otherwise. This was only the
second time the parties had met in a developing county. The government
proposed and won approval for the Delhi Ministerial Declaration saying