“Monsoon Rains Displace 400,000 People in India”:http://ens-news.com/ens/jun2003/2003-06-17-01.asp
bq. With some railway lines submerged, transport links to the district have been disrupted forcing people to use makeshift boats and rafts of banana leaves and bamboo to get around. The International Red Cross says its volunteers are also using such rafts to distribute relief supplies to those who have been affected, including food provided by the government.
This is an annual phenomena. While one part of the country is submerged under water, other parts of the country would be reeling under the heat wave without any water. In his book “Ignited Minds”:http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0143029827/jksobservat-20, APJ Abdul Kalam writes on his visit to Tezpur University in Assam.
bq. When I finished giving autographs I faced two interesting questions. One was: “Why cannot water from the Brahmaputra, which is in flood much of the time, be diverted to Rajasthan or Tamil Nadu which are starved of water?”
And his reply to the student was that India needs to connect its rivers across state boundaries. The present Government has started the “river linking project”:https://varnam.org/archives/000074.html under a directive from the Supreme Court.
River Linking – II
Published
Well, if Vajpayee is keen on using this as a political carrot, I am sure there are other state level politicians who would use this issue for their own agenda. The fact that Tamil Nadu and Karnataka fight so much for the water is just an example of how things can get complicated. Hopefully better sense will prevail.
BTW JK while you were in Kerala, did you notice that compulsory blackouts (called load shedding) comes into effect couple of days before the monsoon and stays on well into the monsoon season. Ironic ain’t it?
Yes we had pre-announced power cuts for half an hour daily. I though they were taken off after we got enough rains in the catchment areas.
The people who speak in favour of interlinking of rivers are not government `acolytes’, but well-wishers and those having a dream for India, its population and their well-being. They want to see the poor and underprivileged masses also sharing the bounties of overall socio-economic development like their western brethren or other more fortunate countrymen. They want to see that the misery of those millions perpetually suffering from drinking water scarcity, floods,
droughts etc. is alleviated. They want a better abetment of never-ending problems that continue year after year despite ploughing of thousands of crores of rupees every year in the affected areas and states in various relief works.
Let the VISION of our Missile Man “APJ” be a reality and let’s March towards the Economic Superiority.
We call the interlinking of river basins a dream that would be an equalizer for the people. But the devil lies in the implementation. At a cost of 5, 60, 000 crores, it requires building of more dams and canals when 80% of the larger dams initiated since independence are still under constuction or mired in controversy, with no solutions in sight. It would be wise to complete these first instead of buiding new ones. Moreover a cost benefit analysis needs to be done , in tems of people displaced and landa submerged in implementing this project. With fertile land already a scarcity where are these people going to be rehabilitated and last but not the least unless water becomes a centre matter from the state, political will will change every five years with elections.