Ramachandra Guha in The Telegraph, Calcutta:
“Jairam Ramesh’s judicious, sensible recommendations attracted hysterical condemnation from a New Delhi newspaper wedded to the doctrine of “growth at all costs”.
“The newspaper ran an editorial accusing India’s excellent and extremely well-qualified environment minister of “gadding about looking for more fashionable causes to sponsor”. It charged him with seeking to “destabilize an entire region’s development”.
“A few days later, the newspaper ran another editorial demanding quick clearance of all dam projects in Arunachal Pradesh. It claimed the “environment ministry has been careless and unwise in its approach to the various relatively small (sic) projects that have been planned for Arunachal in an attempt to increase the region’s prosperity and integration into the rest of the economy”. Warming to the theme, the editorial insinuated that by keeping Arunachal “backward”, Ramesh was merely playing into the hands of the Chinese.”
Read the full article: Dams and the damned
Link via S.D. Gal
IJR 
Rules are rules, but pragmatism is something that should go well with the observance of every rule. Jairam Ramesh not only sounds bombastic, often, but also tends to put a spoke into the wheel even in places where it should rather be a smooth, trouble-free sail. Rules are made for the people, and the ultimate concern of a minister should be how to balance growth with environment protection in ways as to benefit the people. The good thing about him is he is among the few ministers who maintain a clean image. And, his hard-edged policies have done some good too.