AOL event: Team Sri Sri says did not destroy Yamuna floodplains, terms NGT report unscientific, baseless

A day after the National Green Tribunal (NGT) report concluded that the ‘World Culture Festival’ extravaganza organised by the Art of Living (AOL) has ‘completely destroyed’ the Yamuna riverbed, team Sri Sri Ravi Shankar has called it ‘baseless’ and ‘unscientific’.

Environment expert and a close associate of Sri Sri has claimed that the expert committee members came out with a conclusion that there was a damage of Rs 220 crores after they took a 45-minute walk. “However, there was no scientific listing of what was damaged, no quantification," he said.

The reactions from team Sri Sri comes after a group of seven experts said in a report that AOL event, which was held in March, "completely destroyed and not simply damaged the riverbed".

“The committee observes that entire floodplain area used for the main event site i.e. between DND flyover and the Barapulla drain (on the right bank of river Yamuna) has been completely destroyed, not simply damaged. The ground is now totally levelled, compacted and hardened and is totally devoid of water bodies or depressions and almost completely devoid of any vegetation,” said the report.

“The area where the grand stage was erected (and the area immediately behind it) is heavily consolidated - most likely with a different kind of external material used to level the ground and compress it. Huge amount of earth and debris have been dumped to construct the ramps for access from the DND flyover and from the two pontoon bridges across the Barapulla drain,” the expert committee, set up by the NGT, told a bench headed by Chairperson Justice Swatanter Kumar.

The tribunal had directed the seven-member expert committee headed by Shashi Shekhar, Secretary of Ministry of Water Resources, and senior scientists and experts from National Environmental Engineering Research Institute, IIT, Delhi and other agencies to inspect the site of the World Culture Festival held in March this year.

The committee, in its 47-page report, has said that due to the three-day event, the floodplain has lost “almost all its natural vegetation” like trees, shrubs, tall grasses, aquatic vegetation including water hyacinth which provides habitat to large number of animals, insects and mud-dwelling organisms.

“These organisms were rendered homeless, driven away by intense activity and many were consigned to graves under the debris. This is invisible loss of biodiversity which cannot be easily assessed and most may never be able to return. Far more significant changes are expected in the micro-organisms which are critical to ecosystem functioning,” it said.

The report further stated that construction of ramps and roads, alteration of water bodies and flattening of the ground has completely damaged the diversity of habitats.

“The physical damage in the floodplain and its wetlands include a change in topography which has a direct bearing on the diversity of habitats. Construction of ramps and roads, filling up of water bodies and levelling of the ground together with compaction have almost completely eliminated the natural physical features and the diversity of habitats,” the report said. 

(With inputs from PTI)