|
| (3 of 3) |
4. Will the Proposed Interlinking of Rivers Enhance Water Conflicts in South Asia?
As the country receives a preordained quantity of water either through precipitation or as inflows from upstream countries, experts have been warning India of difficult times with water. News of widespread conflict have been received from many regions. Whether it is between Haryana and Punjab in the North or between Karnataka and Tamilnadu in the South, India has had a spate of conflicts related to water availability. This present crisis however, is a result of factors that have been operating over a long time. One such has been the widely perceived human induced water scarcity (Bandyopadhyay, 1989), which understandably generates the potential background for regional water conflicts to emerge. Another crucial component has been the inherent failure on the part of the policy makers to perceive the upstream-downstream linkages, which have become a major source of conflict over water use in river basins, all over the world.
Conventionally, the thinking has been that inequitable distribution of freshwater leads to violent inter and intrabasin conflicts. The statement made by the President of India (Business Line, 2003) widely supports this view on the basis of which he has said, The plan to integrate the rivers of India (through interlinking) will be a key driver of the growth of the country and it would not only bring about economic prosperity but emotional integration as well. Mitra (2003) tries to find a justification to this argument:
-
Whilst we have failed in the course of more than half a century to resolve amicably the intra-basin quarrels, it will be sheer lunacy if, on top of that, a more contentious issue, that of inter-basin water equity, is added to the already confused picture.
The long-drawn Cauvery dispute as a conflict of interest between a downstream state (Tamilnadu) that has a long history of irrigated agriculture and an upstream state (Karnataka) that was a late starter in irrigation development (but has been making rapid progress) is well known. Unmindful of whether this scheme alters the hydrographic picture of the country irreversibly or infringes the riparian rights of communities permanently; the interlinking project is sold as an instrument for the hydrological equity of the country. Justice and equity depends upon a variety of factors ranging from environmental, hydrological, socioeconomic, cultural, education and traditional. In the present context of interlinking however, it can be safely said that unscientific and wasteful uses of water cannot provide hydrological equity in a country.
Bandyopadhyay and Perveen (2003) have argued that the interlinking project has the potential for generating four distinct types of conflicts. These are over:
- Compensations for resettlement and rehabilitation of the displaced
- Compensation for environmental damages from the project
- Sharing the benefits and costs of the project among the states of India
- Cooperative management of the project in international river basins
While the traditionally followed concept of arithmetical hydrology will be able to calculate the supply-oriented requirements and project them in both space and time, the problem will arise on the requirements that arithmetical hydrology aptly fails to recognise. Water being a state subject, the issue of transference of riparian rights under the centralised river link proposal needs to be resolved simultaneously and equally. Though talks are in place to change the control of water sector from states to Centre and of diverting water from surplus to deficit basins in India, no clear indications are in place as to how the present institutional structure would be revised or changed to accommodate these modifications. This is one topic, which is immensely important and at the same time complex. The absence of an established framework for addressing the conflicts systematically, though global concerns about the need for it have been expressed frequently, perpetuates the dilemma further.
Inevitably, transboundary water related conflicts may also follow. Iyer warns that the scheme risks major confrontation with Bangladesh, which gets much of its water from the Ganges and the Brahmaputra, after the rivers leave India. The water resource minister of Bangladesh has reportedly said that its government had protested to India but had so far not had any response (Vidal, 2003). In effect of which, it has stated that:
-
The north of Bangladesh is already drying out after the Ganges was dammed by India in 1976. Now India is planning to do the same on [many of] the 53 other rivers that enter the country via India. Bangladesh depends completely on water We want no kind of war, but international law on sharing water is unsure and we would request the UN to frame a new law. It would be a last resort.
From this arises the challenge to organise water related administrations so that river basin becomes the focus of activity and the various (competing) water use sectors have an appropriate voice (Helming and Kuylenstierna, 2001). Evidently, so far out of innumerable conflicts that have taken place over water, many have been over quantity and infrastructure. Unfortunately, due to inadequacy of data, many plans for river basin development in developing countries are inflexible and rarely provide alternative strategies. And although more than 300 treaties have been signed by countries to deal with specific concerns about international water resources and more than 2000 treaties have provisions related to water, countries have not devoted funding to manage surface and sub-surface water jointly, scientific data are not freely shared and the requisite spirit of cooperation is often lacking (Serageldin, 1995). The results are economic losses in downstream countries that are greater than the potential benefits to countries upstream, further environmental degradation and continued conflict. It becomes necessary then to examine whether the interlinking project would end up intensifying the already embittered inter, intra and transboundary conflict over water sharing and availability.
5. Conclusions
The proposed interlinking of rivers does not give any guarantee for providing security of domestic water supplies to the drier areas of India, in particular, the dry uplands. The only dependable solution to this problem lies in local level harvesting and conservation of rainfall. The projections of water requirements for irrigation till 2050 are exclusively based on an unpublished work. These are not in agreement with many significant published works and field surveys. Moreover, the improvement in the end-use efficiency in the presently attained irrigation potential and quicker attainment of the yield levels that have already been reached in the experimental farms will be good enough for ensuring food security. For providing domestic water security in very dry areas and to the large metropolis, inter basin transfers should be resorted to. That needs to be based on an approach, very different from the present one of the NWDA, dominated by objectives of physical expansion of irrigation, needed or otherwise. Hydraulic equity at the national level does not mean undertaking projects for transfer of water at public expense, from better water endowed river basins to the dry areas for inefficient and commercial uses through socially and economically wasteful projects, not approved through open professional assessments.
