http://www.dailynayadiganta.com/details/32585
River-linking on priority, says Indian water ministerThe Indian water resources minister yesterday said the issue of interlinking of rivers was high on the ministry's agenda but maintained it could not move ahead before taking states on board.
"As far as the question of interlinking is concerned, the government is seized of the matter and it is a priority for us. When it comes to the feasibility reports, these were prepared because the government is eager to do it," said Pawan Kumar Bansal, the minister.
But he stressed that water being a state matter, the central government cannot move further without taking the states on board.
His remarks came close on the heels of the Indian Supreme Court asking the government to constitute a committee for implementing the interlinking of rivers.
"It is a very, very difficult project. It is a difficult task to arrive at a consensus among states. They [states] are reluctant to get into an immediate agreement on sharing of water. Also, water is a state subject and we cannot impose anything on anyone.
"But we try to take the concerned states on board. Wherever there is a possibility on those linkages, we try to take them on board," he told reporters.
He said that out of 30 possible links identified, five projects were flagged as priority projects.
"Out of those five projects, the detailed project report [DPR] of Ken-Betwa has been prepared. On others, there are talks between states. In one case, the chief ministers of Maharashtra and Gujarat states signed the MoU for preparing the DPR in the presence of the prime minister recently.... The government considers this to be an important thing," Bansal added.
Of the 30 possible links that were identified, 16 are in the Himalayan component and 14 are in the peninsular component.
Explaining the benefits of interlinking, which Bansal prefers to term transfer of water from surplus basins to deficit basins, the minister said the ultimate irrigation potential which can be created in the country is 140 million hectares, of which 110 million hectares have been created.
"If we are able to transfer water from surplus basins to deficit basins, then another 25 million hectares can be directly created in addition to 140 million hectares," he said, adding another 10 million hectares will be the result of improvement in ground water level.
http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=224612
http://www.dailyjanakantha.com/news_view.php?nc=15&dd=2012-03-02&ni=88480
On Thu, Mar 1, 2012 at 11:22 AM, Isha Khan <bdmailer@gmail.com> wrote:
Issue bilateral, action unilateral
Delhi assures Dhaka of discussion, continues to construct around 700 dams, many in line with river-linking project
Over the years India has been assuring Bangladesh of not making any unilateral decisions on its National River Linking Project but it is building around 700 dams on its rivers and many of them are for facilitating the mega project.
Experts say despite what India has been saying, it never stopped the implementation of the project. It went on with the projects that facilitate the mega project even though the matter was pending with Indian courts. The draft of its National Water Policy 2012 also encourages inter-basin transfer of water through river-linking.
According to the final report of World Commission on Dams (WCD) in 2000, an estimated 1,700 large dams were being built in the world and India accounted for 40 percent of those dams.
The report said out of the 45,000 large and small dams in the world, India has about 4,000, which makes it the fourth, after the USA, China and Japan, country to have that many dams.
A follow up report in 2010 named "WCD 2000+10" focused more on the lasting impacts of the report. It said countries such as India and China (which combined accounts for over half of the dams in the world) continues to reject "the report for the fear that it could bring dam construction to a halt".
No newer data was available at the World Commission on Dams website.
Many of the dams are on rivers that flow into Bangladesh.
Khalequzzaman, assistant prof of Lock Haven University of Pennsylvania, in his publication titled "Dams in NE India Implications for Bangladesh" published in 2006, mentions that India has built dams on at least 30 common rivers.
The dams and barrages India has built are causing problems in Bangladesh as its agriculture and environment is largely dependent on those rivers especially the Ganges and the Brahmaputra, experts said. The two rivers are threatened by India's controversial project, they said.
"If they divert water from the Brahmaputra, even Dhaka would be affected by salinity," said Ainun Nishat, vice-chancellor of Brac University. "Now the most important thing is to think about what we should do if India really implements the project," he said.
According to Ainun Nishat, it would be disastrous if India made barrages on the Brahmaputra and diverted water of the river, which is known as Jamuna in Bangladesh.
Interestingly, India continues to build dams putting Bangladesh in difficulty but objects to China's dam-building on the Brahmaputra.
Experts said India has been building dams which it would have built anyway during implementation of its river-linking project. They said the river-linking project would not work if those dams were not in place and that the building of these dams was part of the mega project.
India has been constructing a barrage on the Mechi river in Bihar state for the last few years to divert the water of the Teesta towards the west to Fulhar through Mahananda-Mechi, which is visible with Google Earth.
Retired hydrologist M Inamul Haq, chairman of environment organisation Water and Environment, said, "India has been running a hydroelectric plant near Fanshideowa using diverted water of the Teesta."
He said the water used in the plant is diverted from the Teesta before it enters Bangladesh.
India plans to divert a large portion of water form the Brahmaputra and the Ganges rivers through 30 canals, depriving and ignoring outcries of Bangladesh and some of its own states.
The drafts of the proposed National Water Policy 2012 says that with the current strategy of India, it can only use about 1,123 billion cubic metres of water out of 1,869 billion cubic metres available, if large inter-basin transfers are not made. It emphasises India's need for inter-basin water transfer, which could put Bangladesh in serious trouble.
The river-linking project was commissioned in 1982. Bangladesh has been opposing the plan since 2002 when the then Indian prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee formed a taskforce to get the project going.
The Indian Supreme Court has recently cleared the path for the implementation of the mega project. The court in its order said the central Indian government and the states concerned should participate for its "effective" implementation "in a time-bound manner".
Prior to the assurance of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh last year, an Indian delegation in 2010 assured Bangladesh of not making any unilateral decisions on the Tipaimukh Dam and river-linking project during the Joint River Commission talks on the Teesta water-sharing deal.
Also in 2006 and 2005 India assured Bangladesh that it would not implement the river-linking project without discussion with Bangladesh.
KERALA OPPOSES RIVER LINKING
The Congress-led coalition government and CPI-M led opposition in southern Indian state of Kerala yesterday came out against the Supreme Court directive to the Indian central government for implementing the river-linking project, our correspondent in New Delhi reports.Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy said Kerala would not agree to the river-linking scheme as it was "harmful" for the state.
He, however, said the Indian apex court order was not applicable to Kerala and it was relevant only to those states that had agreed on the river-linking scheme.
http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=224514
Editorial
We are deeply concerned
India's river-linking project warrants detailed clarification
In the wake of a time-bound Supreme Court order, India will now actively consider implementing the controversial project to link 30 of its rivers and divert the waters of Brahmaputra and Ganges to irrigate its southern and western regions.
We are taken aback by the court order and the manner in which the project has proceeded so far, completely ignoring Bangladesh, a co-riparian country with a vital stake in common rivers.
Sadly, we are now watching alarming developments on a matter that vitally affects our interest. At no stage of the process has Bangladesh been consulted, which runs counter to fundamental norms of good neighbourly relations and international custom of engaging with affected neighbours when diverting water that flows through more than one countries.
We would, therefore, emphatically urge India to come out with a full disclosure of its plans and engage Bangladesh and other states who share the common river basins.
As we understand, if implemented, the river-linking project will spell unprecedented ecological disaster for Bangladesh. Many rivers including Teesta will be severely affected, Rising salinity level will destroy farmlands, ground and surface water systems, the flora and fauna on either side of Padma and Meghna rivers affecting the livelihoods of some 30 million people. Existence of the world's largest mangrove forest, the Sundarbans, will also be under a grave threat
Given the enormity of the river linking project, it is clear that it will have a colossal impact on the ecology of the region and affect the lower riparian country tremendously. India cannot keep Bangladesh in the dark while it starts implementing this project.
We demand that all related studies and plans regarding those rivers that flow between our two countries be made available to us immediately. Let our experts study them and suggest ways to move forward on this project without harming our interest.
The spirit of good neighbourliness that now marks our bilateral relations demands the above. Ignoring our interest may prove disastrous for the future of our relations, as we had seen from the Farakka experience.
http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=224418
On Tue, Feb 28, 2012 at 1:32 PM, Isha Khan <bdmailer@gmail.com> wrote:
India to Link Rivers: Contentious project gets court green light
Environmentalists in Bangladesh fear it would spell disaster
The Indian Supreme Court yesterday ordered the government to implement an ambitious project to link the major rivers of the region in a "time-bound manner".
The court also appointed a high-powered committee to plan and put into action the Rs 5,00,000 crore scheme.
The river-linking project was first devised in 1980 and has been under discussion ever since, reports BBC.
Bangladesh has been opposing the plan since 2002 as the then prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee formed a taskforce to get the project going against the backdrop of the acute drought that year.
Vajpayee then said the scheme would "free India from the curse of floods and droughts".
The project that aims to link 30 major rivers and divert the Ganges and the Brahmaputra rivers was also opposed by other neighbouring countries and environmentalists.
Bangladesh maintains that a diversion of water from these rivers will harm its interests while environmentalists say the project will cause an ecological disaster, BBC writes.
Ainun Nishat, a water expert, yesterday told The Daily Star the Bangladesh-India Joint Communiqué issued during Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's New Delhi visit in 2010 called for mutual understanding in managing the common rivers.
But the river link project was initiated without any consent of Bangladesh.
The diversion of the Brahmaputra will have a serious impact on Bangladesh that gets about two-thirds of its dry season water from the river, he added.
The Bangladesh Paribesh Andolon, an environment organisation, handed over a memorandum to Hasina last September when Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh visited Dhaka.
It expressed concern that under the river link plan the flows of the Brahmaputra and the Ganges will be redirected towards the southern and western parts of India, depriving Bangladesh of water.
The project requires the construction of large dams in India, Nepal and Bhutan, besides requiring international agreements with these countries.
Environmentalists say large dams would flood forests and cultivated areas, and cause compulsory resettlement of people, according to a BBC report.
The biodiversity of Bangladesh greatly depends on rivers. The country is already bearing the brunt of a diversion of water of the Ganges and Teesta rivers by India.
The taskforce that Vajpayee formed in October 2002 recommended dividing the project into Peninsular and Himalayan components.
The Peninsular component that involved rivers in southern India envisaged developing a "Southern Water Grid" with 16 linkages.
It included diversion of surplus water of Mahanadi and Godavari rivers to Pennar, Krishna, Vaigai and Cauvery rivers.
The taskforce also mooted a diversion of the rivers of Kerala and Karnataka to the east, and an interlinking of small rivers flowing along the west coast, south of Tapi and north of Mumbai and of the southern tributaries of Jamuna.
The Himalayan component envisaged building reservoirs on the Ganges and the Brahmaputra and their main tributaries in India and Nepal to conserve water during the monsoon for irrigation and hydro-power generation.
The taskforce had identified 14 links, including Kosi-Ghagra, Kosi-Mech, Ghagra-Jamuna, Gandak-Ganges, Jamuna-Rajasthan, Rajasthan-Sabarmati, Sarda-Jamuna, Farakka-Sundarbans, Brahmaputra-Ganges, Subernarekha-Mahanadi, and Ganges-Damodar-Subernarekha.
The taskforce said the linking of rivers in India would raise irrigation potential to 160 million hectares for all types of crops by 2050.
The project proposes linkages between the major rivers by the year 2016.
Yesterday, observing that the project had already been delayed, resulting in cost rise, a three-judge bench headed by Chief Justice SH Kapadia said the central Indian government and the states concerned should participate for its "effective" implementation "in a time-bound manner".
The bench appointed a high-powered committee comprising Indian water resources minister, its secretary, secretary of the Ministry of Environment and Forest (MoEF) and four experts appointed by water resources ministry, finance ministry, planning commission and MoEF.
Representatives from state governments, two social activists and senior lawyer Ranjit Kumar, who has been assisting the court in the case, will also be in the committee as members.
http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=224227
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