The Hindu : Mulayam writes to PM on river link

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Feb 23, 2004

National

National

Mulayam writes to PM on river link

By Gargi Parsai

NEW DELHI, FEB. 22. The Centre has had to slow down its pace on the "prioritised" Ken-Betwa river link after the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister, Mulayam Singh Yadav, wrote twice to the Prime Minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, raising serious reservations on the proposal.

According to sources, Mr. Yadav has sought amendments to the proposed Ken-Betwa link between Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh in the Bundelkhand region, saying that the planning deprived some of the areas of irrigation and power generation from ongoing projects. Mr. Yadav is not the only one who has raised serious objections to interlinking of rivers. Before him, the Kerala Chief Minister, A.K. Antony, also wrote to the Task Force on Rivers Interlinking against the proposed Pampa-Achankovil-Vaipar link with Tamil Nadu. The Rashtriya Janata Dal leader, Laloo Prasad Yadav, has also expressed reservations on diversion of any water from the Ganges in Bihar. Mr. Yadav has strongly objected to the feasibility report prepared by the National Water Development Agency (NWDA). Though official sources said the U.P. irrigation officials were present in the meetings of the Technical Advisory Committee when it met, Mr. Yadav has disputed the water flows in Ken as shown by the NWDA in its feasibility report.

He said the areas being irrigated in parts of Lalitpur and Jhansi would be deprived after the link canal was constructed.According to him, the State's share of water from the proposed Gangau dam has been reduced by nearly 40 per cent under the proposed link which will affect the farmers of Banda and Hamirpur.On August 15, 2003, Mr. Vajpayee had announced that the Ken-Betwa link along with Parbati-Kalisindh-Chambal link between Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan would be taken up on "priority" before the year-end. However, so far only discussions are going on on the feasibility report on Ken-Betwa, which will now have to be redone and updated following Mr. Yadav's objections.

On the Parbati-Kalisindh, the feasibility report has not yet been finalised.

These two links are among the 30 river links proposed by the Centre.Spot surveys and "people's parliament," organised by the Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology, highlighted the criticism that the link was justified as it assumed low water requirement in Ken basin and higher water requirement in Betwa basin without exploring the local/groundwater options.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

National