Round table discusses damage due to data centres

A round-table meeting on Saturday saw environmental and agricultural activists deliberate on the harmful impact of big data centres on public resources and environment.

Former civil servant and noted environmentalist E.A.S. Sarma said data centres put the water and power security of people at risk, and cost them higher due to subsidies offered to foreign companies. They are exempted from pollution control laws and labour laws, even while not providing much employment.

Mr. Sarma also spoke about lack of any law to regulate the data centres, and though there are provisions to protect the environment, they are not being enforced in the name of Ease of Doing Business.

“We are a crony capitalist country. Our entire democracy is contractors at lower level and corporates at higher level,” Mr. Sarma said. He expressed belief that in three to four years, the AI bubble will burst and data centres would end up as museums.