Sir Arthur Cotton who had originally proposed this networking more than a century ago and Dr. K.L. Rao who in post-Independence India revived this proposal were no doubt eminent engineers. Sir Cotton's prime concern was for an inland navigational network and Dr. Rao's concern was irrigation and power. Neither could perceive that far wider issues were involved.

Today's populist politicos have developed a peculiar mindset.  They think their job is to get more and more water from wherever they can to enable its use by the locals for immediate gain, whatever the long-term consequences. No thought is spared as to how flow-irrigation affects soil health and the river health, which crops are conducive to meeting the community's requirements for healthful living-as distinct from some large landholders' commercial interests-and what are the levels of the desired crops' water requirements; and what kinds of intercommunity and interstate conflicts can arise from unfrugal water consumption.

That networking of rivers can mean flow of pollutants from higher gradients to cause distress to newer areas also does not enter into their calculations. That over-irrigation condemned Mesopotamia in West Asia, once the cradle of civilisation, to barrenness for the last three thousand years, does not deter them. Few care to remember that the districts of Layalpur, Montgomery and Sargoda (now in Pakistan), which were once the showpieces of irrigation-induced prosperity, are now haying to fight the scourge of salinity.

Deeper questions of ecology always get by passed in our country .The fact that needs to be grasped is that each river's water properties are different from those of every other river, depending on the characteristics of its source, the characteristics of its catchment areas and basin as a whole. The difference of water properties lies not only in their softness of hardness.  Their mineral contents, extent of aeration, electrochemical properties, healing power are different. On these distinctive properties depend the kind of aquatic species they nurture, the varieties of insects and birds that hover over their water surface and nestle on their banks.

What value which underwater or above-water species has for the web of life or even for mankind's own welfare, nobody knows. Very little study has been done on these aspects, river-segment-wise. In the USA, when the large Tellico damn was nearing completion after colossal expenditure, the Courts ordered the abandonment of the project because the river was the home of the small darter fish which was not available anywhere else. If all our rivers are interconnected, many species of life will disappear, many species-and varieties within species---of fish, molluscs, insects, birds and other animals will be extinct. The loss will be irreversible.

Let us take a look at the other aspects of this grandiose scheme. Shri R.K. Murthy, a retired engineer of the Neyvelli Lignite Corporation, has gone on record to say that it was only during Indira Gandhi's time that the project was seriously discussed---and given up---because of formidable geo---technological hurdles and mind-boggling costs. "At Patna, which is the only point along the course with a divertible surplus, the Ganga flows 200 ft above the mean sea level (MSL).

If it is has to be linked with any river in the peninsula, the water has to be raised over the Vindhya Chain-i.e. to 2860 ft above MSL. Pumping 20,000 cusecs of water to that height would have required the entire day's power generated in the country at that time." Apart from the colossal demand on power that it would generate, the project was likely to entail a construction cost of at least Rs. 2,00,000 crores (two million million). This is a sum which no funding agency in the world would even look at.

Even if it were feasible, it would raised terrible protests in East Bihar and West Bengal. Bangladesh, with which India has an agreement for sharing Ganga water, would have raised a hue and cry and made it an international dispute. Ganga would not in any case benefit from the surplus water from Brahmaputra because Bangladesh would not let India dig a link canal through their land.

Let us suppose fro a moment that despite the colossal costs, the country decides to take up the interlinking project. The cost in terms of human displacements will, in that case, be terrible. In the words of Rammohan Reddy, "the construction of barrages and excavations of thousands of kilometers of canals will make villages disappear, flood towns, and cut through millions of hectares of agricultural lands. It will uproot millions, the number exceeding the population shifts of Partition." Then there is the other cost. Already many rivers have become open sewers. In the new setup, pollution control will be more difficult. Hence larger segments of many more rivers will turn to be sewers.

It needs to be stressed even at this stage that while irrigation is important to provide security to agriculture, over-irrigation is ruinous; and that almost all crops barring paddy and sugarcane need just moisture, not flow-irrigation. Earlier, we have mentioned the fate of Mesopotamia and of certain districts in Pakistan. In post-Independence period in India itself, the waterlogging and soil salinity that we experienced in Bhakra canal command areas in Punjab and in the Sardar Sahayak canal command area in U.P. tell the same story .(These are the sad facts which Justice B.N. Kripal missed in the judgment delivered by him in the Sardar Sarovar dam height case.)

Some years back, FA estimated that nearly 50 per cent of the world's irrigated areas had become saline. But the internationally recognised authority and highly respected soil scientist Prof. Kovda-whopassed away a decade back--had placed the estimate at 80 per cent. The estimates have  varied because of the nature of  the irrigation under observation (flow-irrigation, or tubewell irrigation, or bore-well irrigation) and the duration of the observation.

The inter-state conflict over Cauvery water has been caused by the twin evils of unsound cropping practices and putting into disuse the traditional and highly efficacious rain water harvesting systems. Inviting their own long-term ruination, the farmers of Thanjavur delta in Tamil Nadu keep insisting on three crops of water-intensive paddy for short-term commercial gain. In Karnataka, the farmers of Mandya have been cultivating sugarcane, a water-intensive cash crop, in the name of protecting their agricultural right. These are comparable to the cultivation of paddy, the high water demanding crop, in the scanty-rainfall area of Punjab and the cultivation of sugarcane on a large scale in Maharashtra.

Before our very eyes, India's fertile soils are marching towards salinization. The State governments and the Union government are presiding over the march towards ruination. Now, these governments are going further ahead into succumbing to the myopic large farmers' demand for connecting the rivers so that the latter can grow more cash crops unsuited to their soils. Somebody will have to write a new Mahabharat of our blind kings acquiescing in the conversion of this once-fertile country into a vast wasteland.

Dr. I.C. Mahapatra, a noted agronomist has suggested an alternative crop pattern for Karnataka and Tamil Nadu which can be grown with minimum water. It will save their soil and possibly yield them higher income. "In non-irrigated ('rainfed') areas, Karnataka can go in for ragi, jowar, bajra, horsegram, red gram, groundnut and castor. In irrigated conditions, it can choose from sugarcane, maize, tomato, brinjal, chillies, mulberry, tomato, potato, turmeric, ginger, grapes, banana and betel. In Tamil Nadu, 62 per cent of the river basin grows rice thrice -Kuruvai, Thaladi, and Samba. Our study shows that if it limits itself to a single crop of samba variety, it can get a far higher yield than today's three crops taken together. It should opt for ragi, groundnut, sesame, castor, blackgram, greengram, sugarcane and cotton."
(Down To Earth, November 15,2002)

There is no point in engaging in grandiose projects inviting bankruptcy while continuing to kill the preexisting rain water harvesting structures whose efficacy was acknowledgely the highest in the world. Today, in Karnataka, "at least 11,000 traditional water harvesting structures such as tanks and ponds have silted up and dried, as the local farming communities, which maintained and used them, have stopped doing so." In Tamil Nadu, there had been wonderful "Eryes" in large numbers whose efficiencies were the marvels of the world's experts. These are now suffering neglect. Besides, Tamil Nadu has been destroying the potential of some of its rivers by sand quarrying. The sorry spectacle of the Qoom River running as an open sewer in the city of Chennai itself shows how it has been taking care of its own water resources.

Whether in Tamil Nadu, Karnataka or Kutch, there is no need for a big project for water. According to India's eminent meteorologist Dr. P .R. Pisharoty-who passed away two months back -"if the rainfall over the area is merely 50 cm per year, then all the water requirements can be met by local rain water harvesting techniques."

In view of the ecological, economic and human costs and the bleak prospects explained above, the
Government would be well advised to retreat from this Tuglakian project of linking all major rivers. And the Hon'ble Supreme Court may be pleased to review its own order, suo moto, in the country's interest.

Epilogue: After this article was written, the Prime Minister, on November 20 last, declared the Government's commitment to linking up major rivers as an insurance against droughts. What is more, this declaration was greeted with applause by Parliamentarians of all hues. The questions that the Prime Minister and his Council of Ministers need to answer are: The most drought-affected areas in this country are Rajasthan; Kutch and Saurasthra in Gujarat; Rayalseema in Andhra Pradesh; and Bolangir, Kalahandi and Nuapara in Orissa. Will this link-up help them? Why is the demand for link-up of rivers not from them but from the rich farmers of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu who persist in cultivating series of high-water demanding cash crops? Do not recent experiences show that local water harvesting techniques can meet all needs? The claps greeting the declaration were without the awareness that this will lead the country to environmental disaster, regional discords, water quality degeneration, soil degradation and perennial bankruptcy.

----Third World Network Features.
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