LEDeG organised a Liveable Leh talk series on 28th of May 2018 in Ecology Centre. Large no of people including representatives from various civil society organisation, well-wishers of Ladakh and many more participated in it.
With the ever-growing urban development in Leh, the incumbent government is striving to turn Leh into one of the best towns in India. But for overall development so much work still need to be done and many issues need to be addressed. To get the better understanding on ongoing work, LEDeG invited the Councillor of Lower Leh, Mr. P.Wangdan Shunu as a Key speaker for the first event of Liveable Leh talk series.
Mr.P wangdan is currently the lower Leh councillor and also the member of the central working committee of Jammu and Kashmir National Conference. He is known for straight forward attitude and man of action. He is famous among the younger generation of Ladakh and promising ladakhi leader to watch for.
While speaking about the current developmental work in Leh town, he laid emphasised on following points, He said “All developmental work should be sustainable and inclusive with special attention to environment. Which can be possible through the involvement of Citizen and public representative while planning for any government developmental work in their respective constituency. Otherwise, it creates a large gap and misunderstanding between the public and govt agency, which hamper the quality of work”.
He also said that “Scarcity of water in Leh town is an example for neglecting the environmental impact of the developmental work and time is not far when we might have to migrate from town, if we continue to walk on the same path of modernisation
“We need to change our stance, if we want to make Leh a liveable, sustainable and resilient town” said P wangdan.
His speech was followed by a long interactive session. Mr. Yeshay Tundup Principle, Lamdon school asked him about the excavation work being carried out in Leh town for centralised sewage system and kind of unbearable inconvenience being cause to the public and tourist. Replying to it, he said “People should appreciate the work which is being carried out in laying the pipeline for the Centralised sewage system as it is in the larger interest of public and the study carried by LEDeG has shown that most of the ground water in not fit for drinking due to improper discharge of wastewater in ground by residents, hoteliers etc. therefore, people should support government to expedite the work and we can protect the ground water from further contamination”.