Water wars: Sale of Indian rivers
January 29, 2011, Issue 04 Volume 8 You can lease a river in Chhattisgarh for 22 years. At just Rs. 1 per annum. While thousands go thirsty IN MAHMARA village of Durg district in Chhattisgarh, Ramoram Thakur, 70, recalls how as a boy he would sing and hear folklore about water, fishermen and farmers of his village, tucked into the western […]
Water Wars: First the dams. Then the damned canals
March 12, 2011, Issue 10 Volume 8 Defying court orders, the network of canals in the Narmada basin is destroying small farms that never needed the water, reports Baba Umar BHILALA TRIBALS often assemble next to what used to be their village, Atursumba of Khargaon district in southeast Madhya Pradesh. Dwarfing them is a 100-feet-wide canal laid high above the […]
Water Conflicts: Let’s Go Down To The Waterline
Political pressure has restarted work on the Maheshwar Hydel Project Dam. Baba Umar examines the mess beneath WHY IS the PMO intervening? Do Madhya Pradesh chief ministers, past and present, have personal interests in the project? After Union Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh decided to revoke the stop-work order on the Maheshwar Hydel Project Dam on the Narmada under pressure, uncomfortable questions are being raised. […]