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National Water Grid As a Priority Project for India Vision 2020

June 25, 2005 -- National Water Grid is the long-term solution to the water crisis in Rajasthan.



Kalyanaraman, Director of Sarasvati Research Centre, advocating the National Watere Grid and National Coastal Commission projects said in Chennai today, "Water management in the semi-arid zones and drought-prone areas of the nation should be resolved as a technical problem and the long-term answer is the setting up of a National Water Grid, analogous to the National Power Grid."



This is in reference to a PTI report of June 23 from Tonk, Rajasthan where Congress President Sonia Gandhi is reported to have offered

relief to families of five farmers killed in police firing in the 'BJP-ruled state'.



The problem should be viewed from a national perspective and a developmental imperative.



The National Water Development Agency of Ministry of Water Resources, Government of India has drawn up a perspective plan for moving Sharada river waters into Rajasthan Nahar as part of the Perspective Plan for Himalayan and Peninsular River Links as part of a National Water Grid.

This would take the waters of the Nahar upto River Sabarmati making it the reborn Vedic River Sarasvati quenching the thirst of over 20 crore

people in northwestern India -- in droughtprone areas of Rajasthan and Rann of Kutch, and Saurashtra in particular. NWDA has been submitting

annual reports to the Parliament every year since this Agency is chaired by the Prime Minister with CMs of all states as members. The Common Minimum Programme of UPA also includes the starting of the Peninsular Water Grid, in pursuance of the undertaking given to the Supreme Court to get the interlinking of rivers implemented in 16 years' time.



Setting up National Water Grid Authority and National Coastal Commission to purify seawater into drinking water for coastal towns/cities will resolve the watershed management problems and make possible the realisation of India Vision 2020.



Desalination can be achieved not only for seawater resources but also to the brackish waters of rivers like the Luni River in Rajasthan and Gujarat in the salty and marshy terrains of northwest India. Similar desalination projects are in operation in many parts of the world to desalinate entire river systems.



We hope and trust that the leaders and policy-makers of the nation would give priority to these projects as a positive step in optimal use of water as a national asset. The people of the country will bless the politicians and remember them for this act of dharma in the true traditions of the nation which holds waters as sacred trust.



The Sarasvati Research Centre hopes that national interest demands that the National Water Grid Authority and National Coastal Commission be appointed immediately to help manage the water resources of the nation in an optimal and sustainable manner. What we have today is not a water resource crisis, it is only a management problem, given the Great Water Reservoir of the Himalayan glaciers which are accumulating water in the form of ice and snow more than the release by molten river flows. NWDA has also proved after 20 years of study by over 200 engineers that the Water Grid can be a reality, making the peninsular rivers also perennial rivers with the flood waters of Brahmaputra, Ganga and Mahanadi, by reviving River Sarasvati and taking Brahmaputra flood waters to Kanyakumari resolving the twin management concerns of recurrent, annual drought relief and flood relief palliative measures.



Dr. S. Kalyanaraman

Former Sr. Exec., Asian Development Bank,

Sarasvati Research Centre,

3 Temple Avenue, Chennai 600015

http://www.hindunet.org/saraswati

e-mail protected from spam bots

Tel. 044 22350557



Tonk, June 23. (PTI): On a visit to commiserate with the families of five farmers killed in police firing in the BJP-ruled state, Congress

President Sonia Gandhi today expressed "shock" over the police action and offered Centre's help to Rajasthan to tide over the water crisis.



http://www.hindu.com/thehindu/holnus/002200506231721.htm

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