Garland of Hype: River Linking A Misplace Technological Fantasy by Dunu Roy

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/828726.cms

Garland of Hype: River-linking A Misplaced Technological Fantasy

DUNU ROY

[ FRIDAY, AUGUST 27, 2004 12:00:00 AM ]

As a former Union minister, Suresh Prabhu ('Garland of Hope', August 14) has obviously had access to several files and reports which are denied to all laymen and most experts in the field of water management. Hence, it is indeed welcome that he has opened the doors to a public debate on the issue of interlinking of rivers. The arguments he has presented and the logic that flows from the given data, therefore, merit closer examination.

Let us first explore how the problem has been posed. Periodic floods and droughts are hardly a "problem"; they are part of nature's cycle, just as much as the monsoon itself. Besides, it is not clear how rising populations will "worsen" this situation — a drought is a drought, no matter how many people live in the affected area. If per capita water availability has decreased four-fold for a three-fold increase in population over half a century, then obviously population growth alone is not responsible for the presumed scarcity. Equally clearly, if the water available in the deficit Sabarmati basin is only 300 cubic metres per capita (CMPC) then it is difficult to comprehend how a further 1,400 CMPC can be brought from a surplus basin to solve the problem. Finally, if utilisable water is limited to 690 billion cubic metres (BCM), can we be foolish enough to say that we will need almost twice that amount (1,180 BCM) in 2050 and then begin calling this imaginary deficit a problem? The first lesson of sustainability is to match requirement to what is available, rather than the other way around.

What about the solutions proposed by Prabhu to such an untenable problem? There can be little difference of opinion over measures such as conserving water, regulating extraction and harvesting rainwater locally. But if, according to the Central Ground Water Board (CGWB), 37 BCM of groundwater can be recharged locally at only Rs 24,500 crore, what is the validity of investing Rs 5,60,000 crore in obtaining a mere 175 BCM from interlinking of rivers? As for the artificial discharge (sic) of aquifers proposed by the CGWB, Prabhu does not disclose that the same CGWB has a feasible plan to recharge 71 BCM into the sands of the Thar desert by bringing the water over 800 km from the Sarda river.

The interlinking of rivers, according to Prabhu, has several objectives. Other than the transfer from surplus to deficient basins through canals and storage basins (sic), the project will also generate hydel power, increase irrigation, recharge groundwater, moderate floods, and open up navigation — besides, of course, ensuring a minimum flow in the rivers. What is not discussed is how these various objectives are actually in competition with each other. For example, the demands of hydel on impounded water are often in conflict with the demands of irrigation. Farmers require the release of water into irrigation channels in the summer season, and that is precisely the time when power utilities want the water to remain impounded in the reservoir in order to spin the turbines. Similarly, flood waters should be stored behind the dam during the rains, but that is also the time when dam managers want to release the waters to ensure the safety of their dams. Ground-water recharges want the flood waters to spread over the flood plain at the same time as flood managers want to confine the flood waters between embankments. Water management, therefore, is not just about throwing a cluster of desires into the same wishing-pot, it is also about resolving the conflicts between competing demands.

The only conflict that is actually recognised by the former minister is the one of finding a solution to displacement. He confesses that the past record (of the government) in this matter has been deplorable. But he does not go into the reasons. Instead, he suggests handing over the job to the special purpose vehicles — yet another term for NGOs. But if governments are incapable of handling even a relatively simple issue like looking after the basic needs of their people, what makes them reliable in implementing gigantic development projects? Conversely, if NGOs are assumed to be efficient enough to do the rehabilitation that governments have not been able to do, why should they be considered ill-suited to participate in policy-making?

Prabhu writes that he appointed organisations of repute to the task force on interlinking rivers in 2002. Among them was none other than the National Water Development Agency (NWDA), set up in 1982 by the (self-confessedly incompetent) government to prepare feasibility studies for interlinking. In other words, the mandate of the NWDA is to prove that interlinking is feasible, and that is what its reputation rests on. To expect that it would undertake an objective examination of its own work is absurd. Equally shallow is the argument that since China and Europe and America have implemented interlinking projects, so should India.

Prabhu's pleas that all studies must be put on the public domain, and that a national consensus needs to be forged on the issue of water management through stakeholder participation, are all exceedingly welcome. But half-measures are not. The public domain cannot be restricted to the seminar rooms of the Central ministries. It should accommodate the displaced and pauperised.

(The author is director, Hazards Centre.)