Dehradun, Sept. 18 -- For decades, institutions mandated to protect and regulate the city's growth, the district administration, the Mussoorie-Dehradun Development Authority (MDDA), the Doon Nagar Nigam, and the forest department, as well as the government have failed badly in their duties to regulate. Local and state level politicians are also to be blamed for promoting illegal mining and encroachments as well as for open violation of urban building bylaws and norms. Their compliance to encroachments on riverbanks, illegal mining of sand and boulders, and wholesome violation of the city's master plan has systematically eroded natural safeguards.

Dehradun's present plight begins to look less like a natural calamity and more like the logi...