India to tackle climate change in its own way, says Ramesh

Minister for Environment and Forests Jairam Ramesh on Thursday emphasised that India would not be told which path to take for tackling climate change. Speaking to 'The Indian Express', Ramesh said: "We are not going to take any legal commitments or binding, mandatory restrictions on climate change as set by others. India has set her own path on climate change through the National Action Plan for climate change. We have set our own eight missions which we will continue to focus on."

Reiterating the "development" paradigm, Ramesh said, "The Prime Minister has said that under no circumstance will India's per capita emission exceed that of the developed world. This is something we stick to. At the same time, we also have our own growth needs to take care of."

"We are by no means going to go on as business as usual. We are already responding to the concerns of climate change," he said.

Delegates from 182 countries, including India, are currently meeting at Bonn, Germany, to discuss a draft for a climate change deal which may be struck at a crucial Climate Change Meet at Copenhagen in December this year.

In finalising a deal on emissions caps in Copenhagen, other issues like International Property Rights waiver for technology transfer and fund transfer are equally important, India had said earlier. "The issue of financial aid to developing countries and the question of shared but differing responsibility — developed countries should take more emission cuts — is also very important to a global deal," Shyam Saran, PM's special envoy on Climate Change, had said earlier.

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