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<blockquote>
INCREDIBLE CLIMATIC CHANGES IN INCREDIBLE INDIA
January 22nd 2008                                                                              The Climatic Journal
Climate is important to man for it determines his habits and habitat. The evolution of our ecosystem has been dependant on climate and its changes.  After all, the story of man is a saga of his struggle against the vagaries of weather. India has been home to one of the most unique climatic conditions in the world, a befitting situation for a unique country. 
India is a collective medley of six major climatic subtypes ranging from desert in the west, to alpine tundra and glaciers in the north, to humid tropical regions supporting rainforests in the southwest. The regularity in monsoons and flooding of river banks on predetermined dates was a phenomenon, distinguishing India. However, all that has changed in the recent past, as India too has jumped on to the bandwagon of countries undergoing climatic changes due to global warming.
When we are around something all the time, we become so familiar with it that we hardly realize the transformations taking place, and that is exactly what has happened with our environment. But scientific and statistical studies clearly point out what is happening - in bold. 
A recent study by Greenpeace, on climatic changes in Orissa revealed some devastating realities. A village called Kanhapur, clings on to the last pieces of elevated ground on the end of the beach and the villagers there had much to share about their furiously modifying environment. Murali Dhara Malick says, "When I was a child, the village of Kanhapur was not on the beach, but among paddy fields. It used to take us a whole day to go out to the sea and come back home. But the sea moved nearer and nearer to our home until it was only 100m away. On a full moon night two months ago, the whole house was destroyed by a huge wave. Once the water washed over the house, it collapsed” 
"Sea water was coming from all sides even though we were 15km away from the sea. All of my family died. Out of 482 people living in my village, 227 were killed and 147 acres of our land was destroyed. My two acres of land became salinated.
Since 1999, the temperature here has risen dramatically and malaria has increased by 10 percent. I'm afraid that the changes in weather will create storms that will force us to migrate from this place to yet another" says Panchahan Sahu, Farmer and Survivor of 1999 Cyclone'.
For the people of Orissa, climate change is happening and is a matter of life and death.
“Northern India is experiencing what are being called the worst floods in two decades. For the past month, millions of acres of farmland have been destroyed as a result of overflowing rivers fed by abnormally heavy rain in the region.
 At the same time, the south has been languishing without rain for months, particularly in the agriculturally crucial Haryana and Punjab states. The disastrous summer weather is feeding fears of disease brought by the floods and famine caused by the destroyed cropland and lack of rain.”
                                                                                            -  A newspaper clipping from 2004
In May 2002, temperatures in Andhra Pradesh rose to 49 degrees Celsius resulting in the highest one week death toll on record. This heat wave came in context of a long term warming trend in southern India. However, Kashmir and Mumbai recorded their lowest temperatures in 40yrs. 
Glaciers in the Himalayas are retreating at an average rate of 50 feet per year, consistent with the rapid warming recorded at Himalayan climate stations since the 1970s. Local winter temperatures have warmed, suggesting increased glacier melting in winter. The Dokriani Barnak Glacier retreated 66 ft in 1998 despite a severe winter At this rate scientists predict the loss of all central and eastern Himalayan glaciers by 2035 which could result in a massive water shortage. 
When there are heat waves, floods, droughts, glacier melting and temperature drops all taking place as extremities in our country, it is solid proof that global warming is playing havoc with our countries climate and it is up to us to reverse them. 
We have to realize that it is our environment that is getting degraded, and what we lose now may never come back. So what can we do to combat the terror of global warming? A few simple things that we change in our homes could contribute in a massive way – for e.g. Replace a regular incandescent light bulb with a compact fluorescent light bulb, or change the filters in your air conditioners. It’s as simple as that and what it really needs is our determination. Spending a small amount of time and effort to gain a magnificent environment is truly a bargain. 
-	Niranjana Narayanan

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