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April, 2003 |
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Stock Taking |
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India’s
river-linking project by
ENESKE The
turbulent Nepal-India relation on water resources is set to add yet
another controversial chapter with the immediate southern neighbour
gearing up for a mammoth river-linking project. The pipelined almost
nine trillion rupees scheme has already prompted some smiles here while
others are making long-faces. First
the good news. Even as Water Resources Ministry is clueless about the
Indian project, at least formally, some of its high level officials are
optimistic. “If they really build that project, the value of our water
will go up,” said a confident highly placed official not wanting to be
named. That
optimism is based on this fact: planned to be completed in 2016, this
huge project of linking 37 Indian rivers heavily relies on Nepal. To
channelise the river waters (flowing downstream of Nepal’s prime
river-systems including Koshi, Gandaki, Karnali and Mahakali) from
India’s flood-prone areas to drought-hit places, the southern
neighbour will have to build huge storage facilities, water experts
claim. And
the appropriate locations to build such storage facilities are in the
catchment areas in Nepal, they say. The
storage facilities will have to be built in hilly region - and not in
the plain lands - so that the water can be diverted to the desired
destinations. “The canals India would build to link its rivers would
not actually be able to divert the waters without storage facilities at
place,” a noted water resources expert said. In
that case, India will certainly have to seek Kathmandu’s cooperation
to tame the rivers gushing downstream from the mountainous set-up Nepal
offers. So far, New Delhi has not informed Nepal, according to officials
here, even as the project is already a national debate in India. “We
are yet to hear about the project from the Indian government,” said
Bishnu Bahadur Thapa, Spokesman at the Ministry of Water Resources.
“Therefore, we are not in a position to make any comment on the
issue.” Even
if they are tight-lipped for now, officials know Nepal will run certain
risks if it cooperates with India in the latter’s project. The risk of
river drainage blockades tops the list. “And that is where arises the
question: What will Nepal get from drowning her villages to benefit
Indian villages and cities?” the senior water expert said. An
unanswered question indeed. Add to that the oft-repeated issue of
downstream benefits Nepal knows nothing about for now. But
Indian officials are already claiming that Nepal has been favouring the
Indian biggest water resources project. Chairman of the Indian
river-linking task force Suresh Prabhu, according to the Indian media,
has claimed that Nepal is positive about the scheme. “We have been
talking to Nepal and the reaction has been favourable,” the March 2,
2003 issue of the Indian Express quoted Prabhu as saying. A claim,
Nepali officials outrightly dismiss. In
what appears to be a bad news emanating from the planned river-linking
project in India, the scheme could well render blows to the hydropower
plans in Nepal, hydropower experts believe. What
shapes up their fear is the aim of the project to generate 36,000 MW.
The Indian government, through its tenth five year plan, aims to make
electricity accessible to all Indians by. “If they (Indian government)
are serious about the electricity generation, we certainly have a reason
to be concerned,” a senior official with the Nepal Electricity
Authority said. Of
the projected 83,000 MW hydropower potentials of Nepal, barely half of
that, experts claim, is economically feasible. That means the country -
that has so far around 550 MW of installed capacity - will have less
than 40,000 MW of hydropower to generate from its immense water
resources. But, that exactly is the electricity the Indian river-linking project aims at generating. “In that case, what would happen to our projects we have planned aiming at the Indian market?”Yet another unanswered question as India goes all out with its biggest water project whose fate so much relies on the Himalayan river system in Nepal. When will the country have the answers to all these queries is still one more question waiting to be answered. |
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