Sam Daniel

Chennai, Mar 26: Vast stretches of coastal India may just go under water if global warming goes unchecked.

According to a report titled Blue Alert by Greenpeace, if present trends are any indication, there will be a five-degree increase in temperature over the next hundred years.

This will submerge large areas and displace around fifty million people in India alone. A policy change, the report says, can still avert a two-degree rise in less than a decade.

Now an attempt is being made to mobilise public support to force the government to take a firm stand on climate change.

''In Chennai alone there will be ten million people who may be displaced. They'll be like climate refugees. So we want them to understand this and exert pressure on the government,'' said Natasha Chandy, Communications Coordinator.

Many countries have signed the Kyoto protocol in order to bring down green house gas emissions to levels that existed before 1992. But global emissions have actually risen by 24 per cent mainly due to emissions from developing countries like India and China.

Although the US tops the list in Co2 emissions, it wants developing countries like India and China to take the lead.

While a new threat is emerging due to global warming, this is an attempt to build pressure through the public so that India can lead the world in mitigating climate change rather than waiting for a catastrophe to happen.