As countries around the world prepare to flex their negotiating muscles at next month’s climate-change summit in Copenhagen, India has begun to question the Western model of computing global warming statistics.
Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh released a report that says there is no conclusive evidence that climate change has caused the melting of the Himalayan glaciers. The report says that not all of the glaciers are receding at alarming rates and that a few are even advancing.
The report, an analysis of data from the past four decades, is part of India’s efforts to produce a body of indigenous research assessments on the subject.
But many Indian environmentalists said they were confused by the report and the timing of its release, just weeks before the global climate meeting.
Why is the government in such a hurry to prove a large scientific body wrong? At the end of the day, if the scientists are correct, it is going to affect us, not those western scientists!