CH-PYVE

· MONDAY, DECEMBER 7 , 2009 ·

Printed at Chennai, Coimbatore, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Madurai, Delhi, Visakhapatnam, Thiruvananthapuram, Kochi, Vijayawada, Mangalore, Tiruchirapalli and Kolkata• •

ISSN 0971 - 751XVol. 132 No. 289

28 Pages ! Rs. 3.25Tamil Nadu EditionChennai

www.thehindu.comwww.thehindu.in

Regd. TN/ARD/17/09-11RNI No. 1001/57

CHENNAI: The delay in formingself-help groups (SHGs) ofbullock-cart owners has be-come a hurdle for the Chen-nai Corporation’s proposal tomake the city free frombullock-carts.

The civic body in the firstquarter of this year decidedthat it would provide subsidy

under self-employment pro-grammes and arrange loansfor the bullock-cart owners tobuy and operate mini-vans. Itinitially identified around300 carts across its 10 zones.However, the number of ben-eficiaries so far is just seven,according to Mayor M.Subramanian.

The difficulty in making co-hesive groups of men into an

SHG is one of the main rea-sons for fewer numbers ofbeneficiaries, said Corpora-tion Commissioner RajeshLakhoni. “We will take stepsto organise bullock-cart own-ers into SHGs by January,” hesaid. It is easy to organisewomen into SHGs, but form-ing men who are competingwith each other into SHGswould have to be done with

more effort, he said.A. Rajendran, one of the

councillors, said many bull-ock-cart owners were notable to buy vehicles as gettingbank loan for vehicles istougher for such people withlow awareness. Poor educa-tional qualification of manyof the bullock-cart owners isanother challenge for issuingdriving licence to them.

Aloysius Xavier Lopez

Delay in forming SHGs of bullock-cart owners

HOGENAKKALPROJECT SOON PAGE 4

OIL IMPORT TO CONTINUE PAGE 12

FACES CALLTO RESIGN PAGE 13

PAKISTANLEVELS SERIES PAGE 17

BRIEFLYLudhiana tense but peacefulLUDHIANA: The situation inthe city remained peacefulbut tense on Sunday, a dayafter clashes between thepolice and Sikh protestorsobjecting to a religiouscongregation by a sectclaimed one life. Curfewwas still in force. — PTI

FBI team coming today NEW DELHI: A FederalBureau of Investigationteam is arriving here onMonday with “keyinformation” on suspectedLashkar-e-Taibaoperatives David ColemanHeadley and TahawwurRana now in U.S. custody.— IANS Page 10

One more dies of swine fluNEW DELHI: One person diedof swine flu here onSunday, taking the deathtoll in the city to 30.

T oday 56 newspapers in 45 countriestake the unprecedented step ofspeaking with one voice through acommon editorial. We do so be-

cause humanity faces a profound emergency.Unless we combine to take decisive action,climate change will ravage our planet, andwith it our prosperity and security. The dan-gers have been becoming apparent for a gen-eration. Now the facts have started to speak: 11of the past 14 years have been the warmest onrecord, the Arctic ice-cap is melting, and lastyear’s inflamed oil and food prices provide aforetaste of future havoc. In scientific journalsthe question is no longer whether humans areto blame, but how little time we have got leftto limit the damage. Yet so far the world’sresponse has been feeble and half-hearted.

Climate change has been caused over cen-turies, has consequences that will endure forall time, and our prospects of taming it will bedetermined in the next 14 days. We call on therepresentatives of the 192 countries gatheredin Copenhagen not to hesitate, not to fall intodispute, not to blame each other but to seizeopportunity from the greatest modern failureof politics. This should not be a fight betweenthe rich world and the poor world, or betweeneast and west. Climate change affects eve-ryone, and must be solved by everyone. Thescience is complex but the facts are clear. Theworld needs to take steps to limit temperaturerises to 2C, an aim that will require globalemissions to peak and begin falling within thenext 5-10 years. A bigger rise of 3-4C — thesmallest increase we can prudently expect tofollow inaction — would parch continents,turning farmland into desert. Half of all spe-cies could become extinct, untold millions ofpeople would be displaced, whole nationsdrowned by the sea.

Few believe that Copenhagen can any long-er produce a fully polished treaty; real pro-gress towards one could only begin with thearrival of President Obama in the WhiteHouse and the reversal of years of US obstruc-tionism. Even now the world finds itself at themercy of American domestic politics, for thePresident cannot fully commit to the actionrequired until the US Congress has done so.But the politicians in Copenhagen can andmust agree the essential elements of a fair andeffective deal and, crucially, a firm timetablefor turning it into a treaty. Next June’s UNclimate meeting in Bonn should be their dea-dline. As one negotiator put it: “We can go intoextra time but we can’t afford a replay.”

At the deal’s heart must be a settlementbetween the rich world and the developingworld covering how the burden of fightingclimate change will be divided — and how wewill share a newly precious resource: the tril-lion or so tonnes of carbon that we can emitbefore the mercury rises to dangerous levels.Rich nations like to point to the arithmetictruth that there can be no solution until devel-oping giants such as China take more radicalsteps than they have so far. But the rich worldis responsible for most of the accumulatedcarbon in the atmosphere — three-quarters ofall carbon dioxide emitted since 1850. It mustnow take a lead, and every developed countrymust commit to deep cuts which will reduce

its emissions within a decade to very sub-stantially less than its 1990 level. Developingcountries can point out they did not cause thebulk of the problem, and also that the poorestregions of the world will be hardest hit. Butthey will increasingly contribute to warming,and must thus pledge meaningful and quanti-fiable action of their own. Though both fellshort of what some had hoped for, the recentcommitments to emissions targets by theworld’s biggest polluters, the United Statesand China, were important steps in the rightdirection.

Social justice demands that the industrial-ised world digs deep into its pockets andpledges cash to help poorer countries adapt toclimate change, and clean technologies to en-able them to grow economically withoutgrowing their emissions. The architecture of afuture treaty must also be pinned down – withrigorous multilateral monitoring, fair rewardsfor protecting forests, and the credible assess-ment of “exported emissions” so that the bur-den can eventually be more equitably sharedbetween those who produce polluting prod-ucts and those who consume them. And fair-ness requires that the burden placed onindividual developed countries should takeinto account their ability to bear it; for in-stance newer EU members, often much poor-er than “old Europe,” must not suffer morethan their richer partners.

The transformation will be costly, but manytimes less than the bill for bailing out globalfinance — and far less costly than the conse-quences of doing nothing. Many of us, partic-ularly in the developed world, will have tochange our lifestyles. The era of flights thatcost less than the taxi ride to the airport isdrawing to a close. We will have to shop, eat,and travel more intelligently. We will have topay more for our energy, and use less of it. Butthe shift to a low-carbon society holds out theprospect of more opportunity than sacrifice.Already some countries have recognised thatembracing the transformation can bringgrowth, jobs, and better quality lives. The flowof capital tells its own story: last year for thefirst time more was invested in renewableforms of energy than producing electricityfrom fossil fuels. Kicking our carbon habitwithin a few short decades will require a featof engineering and innovation to match any-thing in our history. But whereas putting aman on the moon or splitting the atom wereborn of conflict and competition, the comingcarbon race must be driven by a collaborativeeffort to achieve collective salvation.

Overcoming climate change will take a tri-umph of optimism over pessimism, of visionover shortsightedness, of what Abraham Lin-coln called “the better angels of our nature.” Itis in that spirit that 56 newspapers fromaround the world have united behind thiseditorial. If we, with such different nationaland political perspectives, can agree on whatmust be done then surely our leaders can too.The politicians in Copenhagen have the pow-er to shape history’s judgment on this gener-ation: one that saw a challenge and rose to it,or one so stupid that saw calamity coming butdid nothing to avert it. We implore them tomake the right choice.

Copenhagen: seize the chance

MUMBAI: India reached the No.1 spot in the ICC Test Rank-ings, for the first time, with anemphatic innings and 24-runvictory over Sri Lanka at theBrabourne Stadium here onSunday.

The host achieved its ob-jective after only 7.4 overs ofplay on the final day.

Resuming at 274 for six, SriLanka was dismissed for 309in its second innings.

Third with 119 points at thebeginning of the series, Indianow has 124 points. It over-took South Africa, whichstays on 122 points. Australiais third with 116, while SriLanka, which began the seriesat No. 2, drops to fourth placewith 115. Virender Sehwag,who made 293 in the first in-nings here, was named Manof the Match and Player of theSeries. Sachin Tendulkar in-vited the support staff to thearena to acknowledge theircontribution as a goodlycrowd cheered on.

Australia and South Africaare the only other teams tohave been ranked No. 1.

Captain M.S. Dhoni said:“It is a complete team effort.”Sri Lankan skipper KumarSangakkara acknowledged:“We were out-batted and out-bowled. India was the betterside in the series.”

On top of the world After an emphatic innings victory over Sri Lanka S. Dinakar

NUMERO UNO: A jubilant Indian team after its win over Sri Lanka in the third Test at the Brabourne Stadium in Mumbai on Sunday. India’s 2-0 series victory took it to the number one spot in the ICC Test Rankings for the first time. — PHOTO: K.R. DEEPAK

EDUCATIONPLUS— 8 Pages (Tabloid)SUDOKU— Main Sports Page

NEW DELHI: India and Russiahave practically sealed theframework agreement on anomnibus nuclear energyagreement and bridged dif-ferences on the price to refur-bish aircraft carrier INSVikramaditya (formerly Ad-miral Gorshkov) that willproject the country’s navalpower in the Indian Ocean forat least two decades, saidhighly placed governmentsources.

Describing the proposedcivil nuclear energy pact as“path breaking,” the sourcessaid both sides only needed tosort out one sentence.

The pact covered the ga-mut of nuclear cooperationand was a “significant docu-ment” as it went far beyondthe 123 Agreement in the civilnuclear energy sector signedwith the United States.

The India-Russia pactpromises enrichment and re-processing rights to India andassures the country againsttermination of ongoing pro-jects and fuel supply arrange-ments if bilateral nuclearcooperation is ended forsome reason. The pact withthe U.S. has fallen short onboth counts. “We are hopingwe will sort out that sentenceduring delegation-level talksled by Prime Minister Man-mohan Singh with the Rus-sian leadership,” said thesources.

The new Atomic EnergyCommission Chairman, Sri-kumar Banerjee, will be ac-companying Dr. Singh.

India-Russiacivil nuclearpact practicallysealedSandeep Dikshit

TH Puducherry / 1 Front_Pg User: comkn 12-06-2009 22:31 Color: CMYK