River linking to start in three months: Gadkari

Setting a three-month deadline to kick-start river interlinking projects, Road Transport and Water Resources Minister Nitin Gadkari has said three of the projects are ready for execution.

At the annual general meeting of the National Water Development Agency Society, Gadkari said the three projects — Ken-Betwa linking in Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh, Damanganga-Pinjal Link in Maharashtra and Par-Tapi-Narmada linking in Maharashtra and Gujarat — will be taken up in the first phase.

The projects are ready for approval and ways to raise funds will be explored he said. The projects would cost around Rs 35,000 crore.

A meeting of chief ministers concerned will be convened to sort out inter-state issues so that the three projects could begin in the next three months, the minister said.

Expressing concern over the plight of people in 13 drought-prone and seven flood-hit regions, the minister said the interlinking would help address water shortage in drought-hit areas.

The national river linking project will ease the water shortages in western and southern India while mitigating the impacts of recurrent floods in eastern India. The project will transfer 174 billion cubic meters of water through a canal network of about 14,900 km.

The NDA government headed by Atal Bihari Vajpayee had formed a task force on interlinking of rivers headed by Suresh Prabhu.

DH News Service