River linking in India to cost Bangladesh $30b a year
STAFF CORRESPONDENT
A daylong national workshop, organised by the Bangladesh Peoples Initiative against River Linking Project on Thursday, dissected the yet ongoing mega Indian project of withdrawing water from the Ganges, Brahmaputra and Meghna basins on the basis of available data and impact studies, and resolved to put up a people to people, people to governments and government and regional opinion bulwark against it.
The workshop that heard water and environmental experts, ministers and policymakers, academics and opinion-builders, was sceptical of some tentative statements by the new Indian government of the likely shelving of the $112billion project, segments of which are under active implementation of the high-powered Indian Task Force and the relevant planning and the executing outfits.
The Supreme Court of India, under public interest litigation, has already indirectly mandated the project that has been taken up by the Indian government with the wrapping up of the feasibility components by 2005, the drawing-board preparations by 2006 and putting the project on the ground by 2016.
Dr Naser Ejazul Huq of the geology department at Jahangirnagar University, Dr Ain-un-Nishat, water and environment expert now with the IUCN, Dr Asaduzzaman, research director of the Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies, Dr AKM Zahiruddin Chowdhury of Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology, Dr Hafiza Khatun of the geography department at Dhaka University, Emaduddin Ahmed of the Institute of Water Modelling, Farhad Mazhar of UBINIG, and Dr Asif Nazrul of the law faculty at Dhaka University, presented their considered data and views on the project.
Upper riparian India intends to control the natural flow of 38 rivers, including the tributaries of three major river systems of lower riparian Bangladesh (Padma, Jamuna and Meghna), by building 30 canals, 74 water reservoirs and several dams, though the project has given rise to widespread protest across the region.
Fisheries and Livestock Minister Abdullah Al Noman and chairman of the parliamentary standing committee on the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Ziaur Rahman Khan were chief and special guests at the inaugural function that was presided over by New Age and Holiday editor Enayetullah Khan. The workshop was introduced by Syeda Rizwana Hasan on behalf of the BPIRL.
The concluding session where the recommendations of the national workshop were placed by Farida Akhtar of UBINIG for the approval of the delegates after they had discussed the draft threadbare in the late afternoon session was chaired by Engineer Quamrul Islam Siddiqui.
Information Minister Shamsul Islam and Environment Secretary Syed Tanvir Hossain spoke as the chief and the special guests respectively. The intervening sessions were chaired by Dr Atiq Rahman of the Bangladesh Centre for Advanced Studies, Mahfuzullah of the Centre for Sustainable Development and Khushi Kabir of Nijera Kari.
Its the question of Bangladeshs survival, Noman warned, adding the country will have to face desertification if India implements the project. He strongly urged the civil society, the political parties, including main opposition Awami League and the ruling alliance partners, to take a common stand against the project, and also carry the national, regional and international opinion with it.
Ziaur Rahman Khan requested the civil society bodies to keep the parliament and the government informed of all data and developments regarding the project, and thus enable the government to take a position and resolve the issue with the Indian government.
If only rice output goes down by a million tonnes or just four per cent, 45,000 persons will loss their employment every year, and subsequently the income loss will be nearly Tk 8 billion, said M Asaduzzaman, adding that the damage will be compounded by the losses in fish, forestry, industry and transport sectors. Adding losses in other sectors will possibly make the figure four times bigger, i.e. about Tk 30 billion a year, he said.
The Gross Domestic Product will be reduced by 1.5 per cent, he warned. The impacts of the river linking project will result in lower surface water flow that will inhibit the recharging of groundwater and wetlands and create unbearable water crisis. Salinity rise will lead to shrimp and power output loss. Mangrove output will be reduced. Subsequently costlier irrigation will lower crop output, which will reduce food production and raise inflationary pressure and food insecurity, the BIDS director said.
The available data and impact studies were marshalled forcefully to give the big picture of what could be a hundred times more devastating than the Farakka Barrage.
http://www.newagebd.com/front.html#4
(archive)