in 1994, the Kerala State Electricity Board (KSEB) proposed a 163 megawatt

Athirappilly Hydro Electric Project. It was to include a

dam 23 metres (75 ft) high and 311 metres (1,020 ft) wide on the Chalakudy
River in the Vazhachal Forest Division about 5 kilometres (3 mi) upstream
of Athirappilly Falls and 400 metres (1,312 ft) upstream of Vazhachal
Rapids (Vazhachal Falls) .

Kerala State Electricity Board (KSEB) proposed a hydroelectric dam across

Chalakudy River in Trichur District to generate 163 MW of power to
augment energy requirement of the State and also to provide water for
drinking and irrigation.

The KSEB initially planned the project in 1979. In 1989, the Union Ministry
of Environment and Forest (Moef) rejected the plan for three reasons - loss of
biological diversity, extinction of species and loss of Athirappilly Water Fall.

The Environment Impact Assessment notification, 1994 was issued by the

Moef under the Environment Protection Act, 1986 on 27-1-1994.

Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) is primarily used to identify and

assess the environmental and social impacts of any proposed major activity
(project, plan or policy) prior to its implementation. It aims to predict
environmental impacts at an early stage in project planning so as to present
the overall impact of the project, find ways to reduce adverse impacts and to
suggest alternative courses of action available to the decision-makers.

The KSEB commissioned the Tropical Botanic Garden and Research

Institute (TGBRI) to conduct an EIA study for the purposes of satisfying the
requirement of the EIA notification, 1994.

The TBGRI conducted a rapid EIA study during the monsoon months of
1996 and submitted a report stating among other things that there will be a
significant reduction in flow along approximately 11 Kms stretch of the river
downstream. It was also stated that ‘the effects of impoundment and
operation of the power project will be felt on the Chalakudy River, over a
length of 16 Kms.’

The EIA notification, 1994 was amended on 10-04-1997, thereby making

public hearing mandatory as part of the whole process.

Public hearing is a process in the environmental clearance in which

stakeholders can interact directly with government officials and the project
proponent about the concerns regarding an upcoming project. Public
hearing also serves as a forum to inform the entire community of the
outcome of the Environmental Assessment of proposed project, to verify the
EIA findings in relation to ground reality, and confirm that stakeholders
have been adequately consulted and have been part of the decision making
processes. People can record their support or dissent through public hearing
and offer various suggestions regarding the proposed undertaking. But the
suggestions of the public hearing report is not binding.

The Moef granted environment clearance to the project on 20-1-1998. The

environment clearance was challenged before Kerala High Court on various
grounds. It was argued, among other things, that a public hearing ought to
have been held after publishing an executive summary of the TBGRI report.
The Division Bench of this High Court held that the KSEB was bound to
comply with the requirements of the notification on 17-10-2001 amending
the EIA 1994. The KSEB was directed to conduct a public hearing and
forward the details thereof to the Moef for a fresh decision. It was observed
that the TBGRI study was conducted in the monsoon months, which was a
violation of what was prescribed. It was also noted that the KSEB projects
are not performing satisfactorily and transmission losses were high.
Directions to the KSEB to rectify these defects were issued as a ‘first step’.

The executive summary of the TBGRI report was published later on. A
public hearing was conducted on 6-2-2002. The public hearing panel was
composed of the District collector, representatives from the KSEB, Pollution
Control Board, the local self-government bodies and 3 senior citizens from
the project-affected area nominated by the district collector.

The hearing panel noted that the public was opposed to the project and
recommended a comprehensive and participatory EIA study including a
study of the downstream parts of the river.

The EIA notification, 1994, was amended on 13-6-2002. It became

necessary to publish the EIA report and then to conduct a public hearing
thereon. The Moef ignored the requirements of the amended notification and
granted clearance to the project on 10-2-2005 on the basis of an EIA report
prepared by WAPCOS (Water and Power Consultancy Services). The EIA was
done in a very secretive manner and the local bodies and departments were
unaware of the same. It was stated that the issues raised at the public
hearing held on 6-2-2002 have been clarified in the comprehensive EIA
report of WAPCOS, which can be clearly seen as another blatant attempt by
the KSEB to circumvent the rules as the public hearing conducted on 6-2-
2002 was based on the EIA earlier prepared by TGBRI which does not hold.

Consequent to the grant of clearance by the ministry, on December 2005the

Chalakudy River Protection Forum launched the first indefinite Athirappilly
satyagraha. It was supported by more than 30 civil society organisations
and was led by the Athirappilly Vana Samrakshana Samithi members. Their
main slogan was ‘Spare our River and Save our Lives’ and the satyagraha
lasted about three months.

The above mentioned environment clearance was challenged before the High
Court, with the Athirapilly Gram Panchayat filing another writ petition. It
was argued that among other things the WAPCOS report had not been
published, and that a public hearing had not been conducted on the basis of
the WAPCOS report. Therefore, the requirements of the amended EIA
notification, 1994 had not been complied with. These contentions were
accepted by the High Court and the environmental clearance was
suspended.

Thereafter, the report of WAPCOS was published and the second Public
Hearing on the proposed Athirapilly hydro-electric project was conducted on
15 June 2006 at Chalakudy, Trichur district. More than 1200 people
attended the Public Hearing where none spoke in favour of the project and,
in the 252 written representations submitted to the Public Hearing Panel,
the ratio for and against the project was 1:9 respectively. But it is clearly
deductible from the hearing panel’s report that they were heavily biased
towards the KSEB.

Further, a five member EAC (Environment Appraisal Committee) of the

MoEF visited the dam site and related areas in April 2007, and had
discussions only with the officers of the KSEB, the NGO’s were not given a
chance to present their case. EAC also conducted a public hearing at Town
Hall, Trichur, the following day. Based on the report of this Committee,
which was very biased towards KSEB, the Expert Committee for River Valley
projects of the MoEF gave clearance for the project on 18 July 2007. PILs
were filed again by Ms. Geetha, representative of the Kadar Tribe, and Mr. C.
G. Madhusoodhanan, a hydrology engineer, the former challenging the
project on the ground of ecology and biodiversity and the impact on their
life-support system, while the latter challenged the WAPCOS EIA per se and
the hydrological data base used in the WAPCOS study.

The validity of the environmental clearance accorded on the basis of the

2005 EIA done by WAPCOS expired on March, 2008. As agitations about
KSEB seeking out a fresh techno economic clearance arose, an indefinite
Satyagraha was again called in Athirappilly. This satyagraha witnessed
tremendous public support, almost 80 organisations came together to
oppose the Athirappilly hydroelectric project during the first 100 days. The
Satyagraha went on for more than a year but was later withheld during the
2009 Indian general elections

The court proceedings for this case started on 2008. As most of the hearings
were completed, the then chief justice of the Kerala High Court H. L. Dattu
was elevated to the Supreme Court thereby rendering all the court
proceedings irrelevant. Thereafter, the fresh court proceedings started in
2009 and all the hearings were completed. But before the final judgment,
the then chief justice of the Kerala High Court, S. R. Bannurmath retired in
2010 January rendering all the court proceedings irrelevant all over again. It
is to be noted that both the times, as the KSEB was not able to counter
most of the points raised by the environmentalists, the proceedings went
very much in favour of the suspension of the environmental clearance. Later
in 2010, a show cause notice was issued to KSEB. A show cause is primarily
a Court order that requires a party to appear before the court and explain
why a certain course of action should not be taken against it. If the party
cannot convince the court or fails to appear, that course of action is taken.

On mounting pressure from the Government of Kerala regarding the

clearance from the MOEF, the latter appointed the Gadgil committee to
examine the issue and give recommendations.

The Gadgil committee headed by Prof. Madhav Gadgil concluded that

Considering (1) the biodiversity richness, the high conservation value, highly
significant fish fauna with type locality of five new species and as many as
22 endemic and 9 critically endangered species (2) the impact of the project
on the biodiversity and the ecosystem, some of which may be irreparable, (3)
the impact on downstream irrigation and drinking water, (4) the
questionable technical feasibility of the project, (5) the meagre amount of
power that could be generated from the project, (6) impact on the habitats of
the primitive Kadar tribes of the area and (7) the high cost of construction
even without considering the ecosystem services and environmental cost,
the Athirapilly -Vazhachal area should be protected as such and the
permission for the proposed hydro-electric project at Athirappilly should not
be given. The committee further recommended that the Chalakudy River
should be declared as a fish diversity rich area. However, this report was
rejected and was not even acknowledged stating strict environmental
regulations.

Later, the show cause notice was withdrawn consensually. Due to huge
amounts of pressure from the Goa mining lobby and the Kerala church,
Moef formed the Kasturi Rangan committee and instructed them to find
viable ways of implementing the Gadgil committee report after taking the
public’s worries about the same into consideration.

The Kasturi Rangan committee report crossing the barriers of their mandate
observed that the project is vital for meeting the peak time power
requirements; however they were uncertain about the ecological flow. They
concluded that the project should be re-evaluated in terms of the generation
of energy and should be made viable against the loss of local populations of
some species. Based on this re-evaluation and collection of data on
ecological flow, they recommended that the Government of Kerala, if it so
desires could take forward the proposal with the Ministry of Environment
and Forests.

The Gadgil committee unlike the Kasturi Rangan committee did a very
extensive study of the whole issue. The Kasturi Rangan did not even
announce before-hand that they were doing field visits, people got to know
that only after they reached there. The Gadgil committee did proper site
visits and interacted with not only the KSEB officers but also the people’s
representatives and the respective local bodies and they did three rounds of
consultations with all the stakeholders and published detailed reports on it.

In 2015, the environment clearance was extended by the ministry for 5

years, with retrospective effect from 2012. But the KSEB did not act on it
mostly due to the considerable amount of public opposition and protests
against the project, apart from the huge media coverage for the same. As the
clearance expired in 2017 August, the Athirapally Satyagraha was called off
with the declaration that the protest will be resumed if any future attempts
were made to revive the project.

In 2016, when the LDF government came back into power in kerala, the
then power minister, Kadakampilly Surendran made clear his intention on
carrying on with the project. His statements were met with stiff public
opposition and had to retreat. The chances of the project being picked up
again is slim.

Environmental impact assessment, public hearing and expert appraisal

committee’s deliberations are all part of the process of environmental
clearance but it is a harsh reality that they are increasingly seen as
procedural obstacles by the project proponents.

So in this age of alarming climate change, it is important to understand why

environmental impact assessments were put into place and how it is
actually being implemented by the project proponents.

An interesting example of an EIA is the Pooyamkutty dam’s assessment in

1980’s, back when EIA’s weren’t mandatory. Pooyamkutty is a small town in
the Ernakulam district. The duty of doing an EIA there was entrusted with
Kerala Forest Research Institute (KFRI) and they went on to do a proper
assessment and advised against the project citing environmental reasons.
Ever since this, KFRI has never been contacted to do an EIA. This is a clear
case of how these procedures are just obstacles for project proponents to get
an environmental clearance.
It is important to note that the project proponent only decides which
organisation gets to do an EIA and how much money they will earn. If you
look at the patterns of the results of these assesments, in most cases a pro-
project stance is taken. Instead of citing environmental impacts, then tend
to suppress them.