What happens when the rich blame the poor for everything that goes wrong? The poor stoop more unable to carry their increasing psychological and physical burden. This is happening now in the case of the 'developing' Asian and 'developed' Western countries. The 'developing' countries like India, though not exactly 'poor' in monetary sense, look like one in front of the Western countries, being made the scapegoat for anything that goes wrong under the sun.
The common visions of India that come to anybody's mind are the dirty environment and poverty, with young and the old begging for food with ragged clothes and dirty face. This vision of India as a weak nation with less efficient human resource has cost it the seat of influence in major organisations like the permanent membership in the United Nations Security Council many a time. It has been considered a weak voice even in solving internal issues like the Kashmir, terrorism, insurgency by Naxals and such rebellion groups.
Now, the Western countries are mounting pressure on India and China to sign the Copenhagen treaty to reduce carbon emissions in a bid to save the planet from a temperature increase of 2 degree or higher, which is considered dangerous. When US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited India in July, she too pressurised the Indian government into agreeing to a time-bound and mandatory emission reduction protocol. This is highly unjustifiable. As it is very clear, it is a case of an obese person advising an emaciated one not to eat much in a famine situation, forgetting that his own gluttony was the cause of famine.
The United State emits an annual per capita carbon at an alarming rate of 24.3 tons, way above the global average of 1.9 tons and India's nearly 1.4 tons. And the current stock of green house gases in the atmosphere is the result of emissions over 150 to 200 years for which the developed countries like the US and the European countries are entirely responsible because then, India was a land of major forests and villages, without the dangerous, highly polluting industrial emissions. Nearly 1.3 billion of the India's population still lives in villages, with no access to continuous electricity, commercial activities and hence less emission of carbon and other byproducts. Yet we are being targeted for lack of strong commitments towards decreasing global pollution. Let alone the Copenhagen deal coming up in December, the US has not even bothered to ratify the Kyoto Protocol which would have brought pressure on it (US) to reduce its emissions to a fixed percentage. In short, the US wants to profit economically at the cost of the environment and global health.
However, India's major concern with regard to signing the Copenhagen deal is that it may result in retarding the economic development due to restrictions on industrial development. Signing the deal is a small but positive step towards environment-friendly governance and living. But once the deal is signed, countries like India and China will become easy martyrs on the altar of blame-game; most of the uncontrolled carbon emissions and environmental hazards will be attributed to us, the sitting targets, by the countries who have refrained from signing the deal. To contradict the statements that India is contributing more to the pollution, the Indian government has called for a National Action Plan (NAP) on Climate Change for focused energy and climate policy interventions: solar energy, energy efficiency, sustainable habitat, water, Himalayan ecosystem sustainable agriculture, strategic knowledge for climate change and a “Green India”.
The government has also called for boosting solar power production; reforestation so that a third of the country is forested, up from 23%; providing financial incentives for energy efficiency; research on glacier melt; and development of sustainable agriculture.
The Indian government’s other steps to control climate change include grassroots measures like increasing energy efficiency at the level of individual consumers, including a major drive to popularise energy-efficient compact fluorescent lamps in households. The government hopes to increase sales of these bulbs by making them available for less than the market price, using the sale of carbon credits to fund this subsidy.
And now, Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh has reiterated that the rich countries have to take up the tab when developing countries like India rise to meet the economic aspirations of the nation. His viable alternative is that the technology companies worldwide should join hands and produce the technology necessary to beat carbon emission increase and also rise the economy of the countries. What happens at the Copenhagen summit is to be waited and watched. with bated breath because India's decision to sign or not sign the deal will have direct impact on its industrial development and economic growth.
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