Persevering efforts to save Ram Sethu!

By: G.P. Srinivasan

Shri. MS Karunanidhi

Hundreds of people were streaming in to see Shri MS Karunanidhi in the hospital; he is friendly and amicable with all classes and communities of people. With the devotion of Hanuman and the love of squirrels to Sree Ram, he has been dedicating his time and effort and money for Dharma.

Born on 1.10.1953, he is working for Hindu causes since 1976. He is District Secretary, Chamber of Commerce, Secretary of BJP’s Vyapar Manch, Joint Secretary of Textiles and Ready Made Dresses Traders Association, and South Tamilnadu Distributor for Viking Hosiery.

He secured the land and building where Swami Vivekananda stayed (in 1892) and thereby stopped it from falling into wrong hands. Also he has donated money from the Human Rights forum that he founded, and donated part of its earnings by interest to the mutt. His wife Smt Vijaya Rani is heading the service activities of various organizations. He has two daughters, Divya and Haritha.

Ram-Setu satellite image by NASA

  
Shri Karunanidhi has been in the forefront of protecting the Ramsethu, since 2005. He has produced many pamphlets and information about the feasibility and navigability of the Sethu Canal project. He has been working hard to reroute the sethu samudram project and wants to save the Nala Sethu, which was constructed by the vanara sena during the Ramayana war. On 21st March 2007, Shri Murali Manohar Joshi former HRD minister under BJP regimes visited Rameshwaram with a team to be appraised of the implications of the sethu canal project and its dangers to the world’s oldest Hindu heritage site. The protesters which comprised Hindus, Christians and Muslims met the former HRD minister. What can possibly bring the three together?

The Hindus want to protect Nala Setu or Ramar Bridge for their spiritual and sentimental attachment to it. Ram Sethu, combined with its Coral reefs, acts as fishing nurseries, and therefore the fishermen, who are mostly Christians, want to save it. And with the new information that it acts as barriers to prevent future Tsunamis, Even Muslims have come forward to save Ram Sethu..

Shri MS Karunanidhi has briefed the minister and his team. Earlier he has met the Union minister TR Baalu to appraise him of the facts. To top it all, it is worth pondering over the fact, which Shri Karunanidhi has been single handedly fighting since 2005. Is it not surprising that the BJP which takes pledge in the name of Sri Ram, took so long to identify the dangers? Why was it sluggish to wake up to the dangers of the Sethu canal project? The map indicates the alternative route suggested by local experts, who know the topography for the Sethu canal project, shown in solid line instead of the doted line suggested by the proponents of the project and the policy makers. The proposed project cuts through the Nala Sethu, shown in doted line. The protesters demand to reroute the project by cutting through the Rameshwaram island.
 

Alternative route for Sethu canal project

Dr. S. Kalyanaraman, Ph.D. of Sarasvati Research Centre, Chennai had issued a statement earlier on Feb 18, 2007, "Sethusamudram Channel, Ramar bridge, Kerala and Bharatam coastline" in which he said :  "Sethusamudram project has been put on fast track, with little concern for detailed impact analyses on lives of coastal people and the imperative of continuous dredging operations to operate the channel." And he has quoted from a Tsunami expert about the most devastating impact of the project and quotes from Dr.Tad S.Murthy, who is the chief editor of the reputed International Tsunami Journal "Science of Tsunami Hazards" for over two decades, who has made a model of the Impact of the Tsunami, if the Setu canal, that acts as a barrier against the deadly Tsunamis, is breached by the ill conceived project.
 
Dr. Tad S. Murthy says: "I like this (Sethusamudram) project’, he said, ‘but there is a flaw. The entrance to the channel should be re-oriented towards the eastern side. Otherwise, there is a chance that it may create a deepwater route for another devastating tsunami. This may cause huge destruction in Kerala." Let me explain why the warning should be taken seriously.
 
During the last tsunami, the Ramar Bridge (at a high elevation) from the rest of the shoal accumulations acted as a natural barrier preventing the direct devastation of the entire Bharatam coastline south and southwest of Nagapattinam.(For those who want to see an animated model of how the last tsunami moved, visit the following website http://www.sethusamudram.in/Simulation/Sethu_DHI%20Tsunami%20Model.gif).

This shows the spread of the massive displacement of waters by the plate tectonic event at Aceh. The spread was down the southern Tamilnadu coastline, circled the entire Srilanka island and moved partially into Kerala and towards the Ramar bridge. This circling around Srilanka occurred because the Ramar bridge acted as a natural shoal barrier preventing the inflow of waters.
 
If a Sethusamudram channel is dug through the bridge, it will act as the channel for the waters to flow directly into the entire southern India coastline beyond Dhanushkodi and into the coastline of Kerala right into the Konkan region. The devastation of such direct onrush of tsunami waters will be incalculable.

Related HJS Caption
> Save Sree Ram Setu