Against scientific warnings, carbon emissions continue to rise in China, the U.S. and India, three of the biggest emitters. Brazil is encouraging — under the false pretext of promoting economic growth — unprecedented deforestation of the Amazon rainforest. 

Amidst this dangerous setting, global leadership must act with far greater urgency, and countries, including India, ought to switch rapidly from polluting fossil fuels to cleaner renewable energy, while building much stronger coastal and inland defences against climatic damage. 

In Indian context:

India is one of the most vulnerable country to climate change as per HSBC’s 2018 assessment.

As global warming worsens, the hardest hit by the resulting floods, storms, heatwaves and droughts will be in India.

Measures relating to the climate risk consider the exposure or sensitivity of countries to climate impacts on the one side, and their ability to cope on the other. 

• A number of Indian States have experienced extreme heatwaves in the past three years, and the nation’s capital recently recorded a temperature of 48°C, its hottest day in 21 years.
• India’s exposure to climate hazards is heightened by the location of its vast coastline in the eye of the storm, across the Indian Ocean, Bay of Bengal and the Arabian Sea. 
• Increasing temperatures and changing seasonal rainfall patterns are aggravating droughts and hurting agriculture across the country. Extreme storms like the one that hit Odisha this year and the floods that swept Chennai in 2015 are the new normal. 

Way ahead: Building resilience

• India is not doing enough to boost its coastal and inland defences. 
• It also needs to do more to build resilience in the sectors of agriculture, fisheries, manufacturing, energy, transport, health, and education. 
• The priority for spending at the national and State levels for disaster management needs to rise. Adequate resources must also be allocated for implementing climate action plans that most States have now prepared.

Conclusion:

As the country that is most at risk for climate damage, India should lead in pressing the global community to take sweeping climate action. Meanwhile, the nation must reinforce its infrastructure and adapt its agriculture and industry. Equally, India also needs to replace urgently its fossil fuels with renewable energy.