As the efforts to evacuate 41 workers trapped in a tunnel near Silkyara in the Uttarkashi district of Uttarakhand are weeks away from fruition, the infrastructure development trajectory in the Himalayas comes under serious clouds — once again. Can the current model of widening roads, rampant construction of hydropower projects, and the unbridled impetus for tourism be a sustainable way of development? The Char Dham Project, all-weather roads, being constructed by the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) in Uttarakhand, linking the four religious pilgrimages of Gangotri, Yamunotri, Badrinath, and Kedarnath, has brought into focus two major issues in the Indian Himalayan Region (IHR).
The foremost one is about the development model itself and, in concrete terms, what should be the carrying capacity of the IHR. Also important are the processes in which environment clearances were sought, undermining safety protocols, and a new form of architecture that should be built to construct and monitor infrastructure projects, if at all they are desired, in the region. The irony is that the flash floods of 2013 in Uttarakhand are suggested as the reason for the construction of the Char Dham Yatra. In a way, a tragedy becomes a source for many tragedies in the offing! In 2016 the Prime Minister announced that the Surface Transport Minister was acting like Shravan Kumar, a character in Ramayan who took his blind parents to pilgrimage. Likewise, the Minister is constructing these connections between the four holy towns. Not realising that this is against the wishes of nature.
