RAM SETU – The betrayal by BJP Govt, then by Mr Vajpayee and now by Mr Modi

Many Hindus are unaware of the betrayal done to their Hindu faith and beliefs by the Vajpayee Govt and Modi Govt on the issue of Ram Setu then and now. The promise made to Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) Party by the then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and his decision almost blew up the Ram Setu. To get an accurate idea let's dig up some untold facts.

Geography of South India

To the south of India, there is the Indian Ocean, the Bay of Bengal at the east and the Arabian Sea at the west. India’s coast has no continuous navigation channel connecting the west and east coasts. This is due to the presence of a shallow region of Ram Setu, located southeast of Rameswaram near Pamban that joined Sri Lanka to the continent of Asia, which separates the Gulf of Mannar and Palk Bay. The ships coming from the west coast of India or from western countries with destinations east coast of India or eastern neighbourhood countries of India, it has to circumnavigate Sri Lanka. It cannot directly go through Indian waters. 

Setu Samudram Channel Project

Creating a straight passage for the ships navigating from the west to east coast of India through Indian waters has been planned before Independence. During the British era, in 1838 efforts were made to dredge the canal which went in vain. In 1860, the Commander of Indian marine A. D. Taylor conceived the project and was revised several times without a decision being made.

After Independence, in 1955 the Government of India constituted the Setu Samudram Project Committee under A. Ramaswamy Mudaliar to examine the feasibility and desirability of connecting the Gulf of Mannar with Palk Bay and its impact on the port of Tuticorin. The Committee recommended the canal project be linked with the Tuticorin Harbour project and that both projects be undertaken simultaneously. But the report of the Committee was put in cold storage and the Tuticorin Harbour project was only sanctioned by the Government. Thereafter several committees were formed, which revised the cost of the project upward and no significant decision was taken on the same. 

In 1999, during NDA rule (a coalition of BJP) under the then Prime Minister Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee the project got momentum. In a presentation of the Initial Environmental Examination (IEE) by the National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (NEERI) before the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) in April 1999, it was conveyed that prima facie they were not in favour of the project as the project had serious environmental implications concerning the marine park and the biosphere reserve located in the area. Considering the opinion of NEERI, the then Minister of Shipping, Arun Jaitley gives approval for the Detailed Feasibility Study and the Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) of the project on March 9th, 2001 (1). The same were assigned to NEERI. Then Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha made a necessary provision of Rs 4.8 crores for the feasibility study and EIA of the Setu Samudram Channel Project (2).

In October 2002, NEERI submits the interim progress report on the Rapid Environmental Impact Assessment for the Sethu Samudram Channel Project in which it recommends “create a channel originating from the Tuticorin New Harbour in the Gulf of Mannar, extend towards the east and further north-east up to the south of Pamban Island, then cut through Ram Setu, thereafter proceed parallel to the International Medial Line before finally joining the Bay of Bengal” (3). This changed the entire nature of the project. All the earlier alignments had no plan to cut the Ram Setu. The recommendation of NEERI was agreed upon and the then Shipping Minister Ved Prakash Goyal (Minister of Shipping was changed on September 1^st, 2001) constituted a committee under the Secretary of Ministry of Shipping to review the progress of studies assigned to NEERI and put the project in fast track (4).

By the time NEERI submitted its final reports on the Feasibility Study and EIA in 2004, NDA had lost the general elections and UPA was in power. The project got on to real fast track under the new Minister of Shipping T. R. Baalu. In 2005, Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh inaugurated the project, with the alignment recommended by the interim progress report of NEERI which cut Ram Setu (5).

Political Angle: Promise of Mr Vajpayee to DMK

Mr Vajpayee, while participating in the C.N. Annadurai’s birthday celebrations in Chennai on September 15, 1998, stated that the BJP government would implement the Setu Samudram project at the earliest (6). When the United Front Government collapsed in 1998, Mr Vajpayee made an alliance of 13 parties including the BSP, AIADMK, the TDP and the TMC and formed the Government. The Government could hardly last for a year due to the withdrawal of support by the AIADMK. 

In 1999, Mr Vajpayee again came to power with the support of 20 other parties including DMK. This was the time when the Setu Samudram Channel Project got momentum. Then Defence Minister George Fernandes reiterated the promise of Mr Vajpayee to DMK and announced that the project will be started within a few months. DMK with its 40 MPs in the Government was hell-bent on implementing this project and BJP too had no objection then to cutting Ram Setu.

In the 2004 General elections when NDA lost and UPA came to power, DMK joined UPA as an ally. Mr T. R. Baalu of DMK was made Minister of Shipping under UPA Government and he played a pertinent role in putting the project on a fast track.

Ignorance of the impact of Tsunami after SSCP

The Study by NEERI which recommended the route which cuts Ram Setu had not taken into account the impact of the Tsunami after cutting Ram Setu. 

R. Ramesh, a Scientist of Indian descent in the US, in his journal article titled “Will to Disaster: Post-Tsunami Technical Feasibility of Sethusamudram Project” published in Economic and Political Weekly, clearly mentions that Environmental Impact Assessment and Technical Feasibility Report for SSCP has ignored the impact of sedimentation, cyclones and tsunami in their entirety (7).

The question of the impact of the tsunami was raised after the tsunami hit the states of Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu along the southeastern coastline of the Indian mainland on December 26th, 2004. One of the leading scientists on tsunamis and tsunamis of the Indian Ocean in particular, Prof. Tad S Murthy opined that due to the presence of Ram Setu, the destruction due to the tsunami is minimum to Kerala, while it had created havoc in Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. Also, pointed out that the NEERI report had no feasibility study of the Setu Samudram Project on tsunamis after cutting Ram Setu. 

BJP’s change of heart and resolution to Save Ram Setu

The BJP which under Mr Vajpayee, supported and approved the project, got enlightened after its defeat in the 2004 General elections and started opposing the same as Opposition in the Parliament. The questions raised by the then BJP parliamentarians against the project were royally thrashed by the then Minister of Shipping T. R. Baalu by quoting their own approvals and decisions taken by them on the project when they were in power.

However, BJP in its party meeting passed the 9-point resolution titled “SAVE RAM SETU, SAVE HERITAGE, SAVE INDIA”. In the resolution BJP stated that Ram Setu is a matter of faith to Hindus, hence there should be no tampering with it in any way due to the project. Also in its 9^th point, it stated – “The government should make serious efforts for Ram Setu being declared as world heritage since this is the world's oldest man-made bridge. Sentiments of the people must be respected” (8).

BJP in its manifesto of 2009 (9) and 2014 (10)  had clearly mentioned giving the National Heritage status to Ram Setu.

Fight to Save Ram Setu

To save Ram Setu from being destroyed under the UPA regime several Hindu organisations filed PILs in the Supreme Court. In 2006, on Ramanavami day, a nationwide signature campaign was launched to express people’s support to save Ram Setu. A petition signed by 35 lakh people was presented to the then Hon’ble President Dr Abdul Kalam. No PILs or petitions were able to save Ram Setu. 

It was then the President of Vishwa Hindu Parishad Shri Ashok Singhal requested Dr Subramanian Swamy to file PIL to save Ram Setu (11). Dr Swamy with his spellbound arguments was successful in making SC pass interim order stating that Ram Setu shall not be damaged in any way. Later SC directed that the dredging activity may be carried out but there should be no damage to Ram Setu, by this Dr Swamy removed the danger to Ram Setu by bringing the permanent stay order (12).

BJP’s Flip flop on Ram Setu after 2014

When the BJP formed Government under the Prime Ministership of Narendra Modi in 2014, Union Minister Nitin Gadkari in his speech in the Parliament makes clear that no damage or harm will be made to Ram Setu under the Setu Samudram Project (13).

In 2020, DMK MP T. R. Baalu wrote a letter to PM Modi seeking to recommence the Setu Samudram Project (14). In 2021, after DMK forms Government in the State of Tamil Nadu under the Chief Ministership of MK Stalin, Stalin met PM Modi in Delhi and requested him to revive the Setu Samudram Channel Project (15).

Even after the clearance of Union Minister Nitin Gadkari on the floor of Parliament regarding the Ram Setu issue, there is some kind of hindrance within the Modi Government that is stopping to declare of Ram Setu as a National Heritage monument despite promise being made in the election manifesto.

The two replies given by the ministers of the Modi Government to Parliament on Ram Setu are a bit heart-wrenching to Hindus:

Reply of The Minister for Ministry of Science and Technology and Ministry of Earth Sciences (Dr Harshavardhan) on March 19^th, 2018) (16) – “the field geological observation and drilling data could not bring out any indications or evidences of manmade structures in the present day seabed or in the subsurface level between Dhanushkodi tip and Adam’s Bridge Island within the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) of India”

Reply of The Minister for Ministry of Earth Sciences (Dr Jitendra Singh) on December 22^nd, 2022 (17) – “to some extent, through space technology we have been able to discover pieces and islands, some kind of limestone shoals, which of course, can’t be accurately said to be remnants or parts of a bridge”.

The False Narrative on Thorium 

Some sections in social media are busy spreading a fake narrative that dredging Ram Setu will provide the thorium to India. Contrary to this point, it’s Ram Setu that makes the thorium get deposited in the sands of the shores of Tamil Nadu. If Ram Setu is destroyed by the Setu Samudram Channel Project then the thorium reserves deposited in the sand of Tamil Nadu will be washed off into international waters or submerged in the ocean during the tsunami.

Dr S Kalyanaraman, a scientist who runs an independent research Centre in Chennai states in his article titled “Rama Setu: nuke club thwarting India’s thorium advantage” that “The accumulation of thorium placer deposits is emphatically due to the existence of Ram Sethu acting as a cyclotron against the clock-wise and counter-clock-wise ocean currents depositing Thorium-232 on the coastline lands”. (18)

As Ram Setu creates the perfect factors required to deposit the Thorium along the shores of coastal Tamil Nadu and Kerala, dredging or damaging the Setu would make India lose thorium deposits instead of gaining them.

Dr Swamy’s continuous efforts to declare Ram Setu a National Heritage Monument

As soon as the BJP formed Government in the Centre, after defeating the UPA in the general elections of 2014, Dr Subramanian Swamy wrote a letter to PM Narendra Modi to declare Ram Setu as National Heritage Monument (19). The file to declare Ram Setu a National Heritage Monument was cleared in the Ministry of Culture at the earliest but is still waiting for the signature of PM Modi at the Prime Minister’s Office.

As BJP under PM Modi, is in no mood to declare Ram Setu a National Heritage Monument, Dr Swamy filed a PIL in Supreme Court in 2018 to do the same through the court. This petition of Dr Swamy was first heard by the bench of then Chief Justice Dipak Misra and a reply was sought from the Modi Government (20). After that matter was heard by the 4 Chief Justices, Justice Ranjan Gogoi, Justice S. A. Bobde, Justice N. V. Ramana, and Justice Uday Umesh Lalit. Totally 5 Chief Justices got retired after seeking a reply from the Modi Government on the matter (21).

On October 13^th, 2022, CJI Chandrachud had given the time till the next hearing (November 10^th, 2022) to the Additional Solicitor General appearing for the Government of India to file a counter affidavit to the petition of Dr Swamy (22). But as usual, the Counsel did not file the reply by November 10^th, 2022 and had to take a class from CJI – “Why are you dragging your feet?”, then the counsel agreed to file the reply by the December 12^th, 2022 and didn’t follow up even on that date, instead told the reply was ready and he is waiting for the approval from the Ministry (23). Upon hearing this SC gave four weeks to file the reply.

On the date of the next hearing (on January 12^th, 2023) on failure to file the reply before the SC, Dr Swamy prayed before the SC to summon Cabinet Secretary for noncompliance with the direction of the SC (24). CJI declined the request of Dr Swamy and gave the final date to the Government of India to file the reply by the second week of February.

Before that, on January 19^th, 2023, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta informed the court that the process to declare Ram Setu a National Heritage Monument is in process and will be declared within two weeks (25). Following this reply from the Solicitor General, SC dismissed the application filed by Dr Swamy, requesting the Court to order Ram Setu to be declared a National Heritage Monument, with the liberty to file a petition if the Government of India does not follow up on the same (26).

But the Government of India which had promised to declare Ram Setu a National Heritage within two weeks is in no mood to declare it even after nearly five weeks. Considering this on February 17^th, 2023, Dr Swamy filed a plea before the SC bench consisting of CJI Chandrachud to list the matter directing the Government of India to declare Ram Setu a National Heritage Monument (27).

This is the sheer hypocrisy of the BJP, which despite clearly mentioning that Ram Setu will be declared a National Heritage Monument in the resolution passed in 2007 and manifestos of the General elections of 2009 and 2014, is acting like treading water. Isn’t this the betrayal of Hindus by the BJP Government under Modi?