At least 140 died, though many more may have. At least 40,000 were struck by heatstroke. At least one heat-related illness was reported in 45% of households. Birds, bats and monkeys dropped dead from trees, and people died on the streets.

This was a snapshot of an intense heat wave that swept India’s northern plains and parts of the peninsula and the east during India’s 43-day-long general elections of 2024.

During the same period, Manipur suffered hail storms, rainstorms and devastating flash flood. Forest fires raged across Uttarakhand, while the neighbouring mountain state of Himachal Pradesh was deluged with unseasonal rains, wreaking havoc on its main export and livelihood source: apples.

Extreme weather is the new normal in new India. Heat waves linked to climate change in South Asia are now 45 times more likely, according to a global study released in May 2024.

Even as polling staff succumbed to heatstroke, with 33 dying on just the last day of elections in Uttar Pradesh alone, India’s most urgent issue—the environment crisis—was not on the election agenda.

While climate change, air pollution and other environmental issues were mentioned in the manifesto of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)—and in those of other national parties—clear strategies and commitments were missing.

The BJP-led National Democratic Alliance government’s environmental agenda has been the opposite of supportive or beneficial. Environment ministers have declared laws and policies that safeguard the environment and protect forests and wildlife as “roadblocks” and “hurdles to development”.

Many protective laws were changed to make it easy for forests to be cleared for industry and infrastructure (here and here). Changes to the very things that mitigate the effects of climate change and pollution preceded Modi’s decade in office, but his governments over the decade greatly accelerated them.




Sources - https://article-14.com/post/india-s-deadly-climate-change-environment-crisis-what-modi-3-0-must-do-but-hasn-t-ever--668220dc622d3