News | Climate Change

http://www.dnaindia.com/india/report_india-desperately-looks-for-a-chief-negotiator-as-bonn-climate-talks-near_1359528

New Delhi: With a couple of days left for the government to announce its representatives at the climate change talks in Bonn next month, the environment and forest ministry is now counting on its trusted lieutenants.

Because of the differences between environment and forest minister Jairam Ramesh and key negotiator, Chandrashekhar Dasgupta, the ministry has now approached Ajay Mathur, the director general (DG) of Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE) to represent India in Germany.
Mathur was part of the core negotiating team at Copenhagen last year. The ministry is expected to announce the names of the representatives by March 17.
Ministry sources said Mathur was called last weekend and informed about the meeting. He was told to be available for talks. Mathur, however, is not very keen on taking up the assignment as he fears his main job as DG, BEE, might suffer. He had given a couple of months for last year’s conference at Copenhagen. “He couldn’t concentrate on his work as BEE DG, so he is not happy with the idea this time,” an officer said.

Other frontrunners for the job are scientist Prodipto Ghosh, and Indian Forest Service officer Chandrashekhar Dasgupta, a veteran in climate change. But since Dasgupta — who is a known critic of the Ramesh’s policies — is busy writing a book, Ghosh may be picked up for the talks, a source in the ministry said, while hinting at Dasgupta’s differences with Ramesh being the main reason for his departure from the negotiating team.
Dasgupta is not the first person to suffer for openly criticising the minister. The first one to suffer was Shyam Saran, prime minister’s special envoy on climate change. The key negotiator was recently relieved of his duties.
The differences between Saran and the minister first came to light after Jairam Ramesh’s letter to the prime minister suggesting that India needs to dramatically change its stance on issues of climate change and should align with G-20 nations.