Drainage crisis in the Kosi river basin has become an annual ritual of aerial surveys, flood
relief, dubious assurances, and constitution of committees, judicial
probe and the like. Kosi is a major tributary of the Ganga river.
Nothing
can illustrate the fate of various committees, commissions and Task
Forces constituted to study flood and drainage problem since 1950s to
2008 better than what R Rangachari, Chairman, Expert Committee on the
Implementation of the recommendations of Rashtriya Barh Ayog said on
August 19, 2008. He said, `I am not aware as to what follow up actions
were all taken on this Report. It is my impression that really not much
has been done to implement the suggestions made by the committee's
report. Rangachari was on Prime Ministers Task Force on Flood Control
constituted in 2004.
Justice Rajesh Balia
judicial inquiry commission constituted in the aftermath of breach in an
embankment was given nine extensions to undertake a comprehensive probe
on six terms of reference related to the flood-drainage crisis in Kosi
river Basin. It submitted its report in March 2014 with recommendations
for remedial measures. So far there has been no remedial action.
It
is noteworthy that National Common Minimum Programme (CMP) of the
Government of India announced in 2004 made a solemn pledge to the people
of the country to undertake Long-pending schemes in specific states
that have national significance, like flood control and drainage in
North Bihar (that requires cooperation with Nepal as well). Despite
acknowledging the problem, it is shocking to observe that neither
central nor Bihar government `conducts any survey to assess the effect
of flood control measures on socio-economic condition of the society.
This hold true for Nepal as well. Given the fact that the coalition
government in Bihar comprises of parties that had adopted the CMP, there
is a compelling logic for them to reiterate their pledge and act on
it.
A look at the statements of the Indian
Prime Ministers, the Nepalese Prime Ministers and the Bihar Chief
Ministers reveal how they remain enveloped in the technocentric
approaches that caused the calamity in the first place.
After
the breach in the embankment at Kusaha in the Kosi region, Bihar Chief
Minister requested India's External Affairs Minister on 19 August, 2008
to approach Nepal Government to ensure law and order as per Kosi
Agreement in order to repair the breach that took place in Nepal.
On
20 August, 2008, Nepali Prime Minister took stock of the post-calamity
situation in the Kosi region and said "Koshi agreement was a historic
blunder" and "People are suffering due to this agreement". The agreement
led to the construction of embankments and proposals for a high dam.
All
this clearly demonstrates how although the more things change on the
ground, the more they remain the same. A Fact Finding Mission on Kosi
that visited the flood affected parts of North Bihar and Nepal demanded a
White Paper on the current deluge and drainage in the Kosi basin in
general and North Bihar in particular in order to address the drainage
congestion crisis that has resulted from the so-called solutions. A
White Paper on South Asia's biggest environmental crisis in Kosi river
basin is long due.
Following the eighth breach
in th embankments in August 2008, besides four panchayats in Nepal,
four North Bihar districts- Saharsa, Supaul, Madhepura and Araria- got
worst affected by floods. In addition to these twelve districts --
Purnia, Katihar, Khagaria, Muzaffarpur, West Champaran, Saran,
Sheikhpura, Vaishali, Begusarai, Bhagalpur, Patna and Nalanda were
affected by the floods as well. An estimated 35 lakh people suffered due
to the flood crisis. As per Bihar government own reports, 48 lakh
people in 22 districts were in need of assistance due to flood. Despite
the institutional memory of crisis in Kosi river basin, it ends up
creating a situation where "contractors love drainage crisis". The
primary function of floodwater is to drain out excess water. It has not
been allowed to perform its functions due to unthinking engineering
interventions.
Any judicial or executive probe
that does not fix criminal liability is suspect because the fate of such
commissions and committees are a foregone conclusion. It is a routine
exercise of no consequence. However, since the terms of reference of
Justice Balia Commission was focused on Kosi High-Level Committee, a
multilateral body, it merited attention. But the biggest limitation of
the Commission was that it did not and could not question the
institutional status quo that is guilty of perpetuating the crisis.
Dozens of such reports prepared by Commissions of all ilk gather dust
and are moth eaten. At most they become campaign tools during elections.
The
Inquiry Commission should have recommended fixing charges of criminal
neglect against the members of the Kosi High-Level Committee, who waited
for the calamity to happen despite having sufficient information that
could have at least led to evacuation of the people on time prior to the
man-made crisis. However, it is quite sad that the Terms of Reference
of the Commission was so devised as to create a rationale for Kosi High
Dam in Nepal. The Commission has underlined in its report that relevant
departments of the state government did not provide the information it
sought. The report of Justice Balia Commission met the fate of the
reports of the Rangachari Committee and Rashtriya Barh Aayog.
Drainage
problem in Kosi has failed to alter the policy regime of the State that
favours structural solutions regardless of the natural drainage it may
impede. Proposals like High Dam on Kosi is as good as jumping from the
frying pan into the fire if the experience with embankments is anything
to go by.
Even
when one chooses to ignore changing morphology of the river, the
estimated lifespan of a dam and embankment is 25 years and 37 years
respectively underlines the transitory nature of technocentric
interventions.
For
several decades, each and every proponent of embankments, Multi-purpose
Kosi High Dam, and diversion of rivers for Interlinking of Rivers
project have merely been shouting I have all the facts about the dynamic
and unstable geology and violence of Kosi to scare people in order to
make people surrender their judgement. People seem to have unquestioning
and unsuspecting respect for facts. Governments in India and Nepal
relied on these very facts to sign Kosi agreement. Now the Nepal Prime
Minister has regretted the suicidal agreement on Kosi, signed in 1954,
as the main cause behind the flooding of the Nepali territory every
year. Nepals sense of grievance regarding Kosi may be justified because
the treaty reveals itself as outdated and unfair to both the parties.
The proponents of High Dam and diversion of rivers seem to feign
ignorance about decommissioning of 1,797 dams in USA since 1912 to make
room for the free flow of the rivers. Notably, 69 dams were removed in
2020 alone.
Counting
on the Kosi treaty, Union Ministry of Water Resources misled the Rajya
Sabha on March 11, 2008 on the issue of Floods in North Bihar by
claiming, Government has taken various steps in the direction of water
management to stop the flood in north Bihar coming from the rivers of
Nepal. There has been no significant shift in the way the Kosi issue was
perceived in the 1950s and in recent times.
The
treaty has remained quite pronounced because a carrot of Kosi High Dam,
first raised in 1948, has been dangling before the flood victims as one
of the `permanent solutions to the problem of recurring floods.
Ironically, embankments as temporary solution have become reasonably
permanent whereas the `permanent solution has remained elusive. What is
`permanent and how permanent is `permanence? It must be acknowledged now
that there is a manifest and condemnable insincerity in proposing
Multi-purpose High Dam for flood control because the dam is proposed to
tap the hydro-power potential. The multiple purposes (irrigation,
power-generation, flood-control, etc) are conflict ridden because
objectives of flood-control, irrigation and power-generation would
require opposite functions from the reservoir. This is ignored since
well-entrenched beneficiaries across political lines have an incestuous
relationship with the structural solutions like embankments, dams and
their victims that prevents rational vulnerability assessment based
interventions to remove the impediments to the drainage of the
ecological flow of water.
All endeavours at
course correction at this stage must take into account how did the
transformation of flood dependent agrarian regimes into flood vulnerable
landscapes took place since it was primarily driven by the need to
secure private property in land, which was a key concern of the colonial
powers. It `soon disrupted natural flow regimes and ended up
aggravating flood lines and thereby opening up the deltas to enhanced
flood vulnerability; Constructed a network of roads, railway lines, and
bridges, which by running in the east- west direction ended up
interrupting natural drainage lines that mostly dropped from north to
south! These structures, in time, not unexpectedly, began to unsettle a
complex and fragile arrangement for drainage. Thus, north Bihar has been
deprived of the most fertile land in the world. The Royal Commission of
Agriculture had blamed lack of adequate drainage for it. Traditional
systems made the agricultural districts of north Bihar Ganga basin
prosperous in the early part of the 19th century. The neglect of that
system over the years led to the area being impoverished by the late
19th century.
There is a compelling logic
behind seeking immediate review of Indo-Nepal Kosi Treaty that created
the rationale for embankments and dams. Continuing with it would
tantamount to riding a dead horse. The treaty must acknowledge that
technology can only help create irreparable problems. If technology is
indeed the answer, surly the technologists have got their questions
wrong. Drainage congestion in North Bihar and Nepal is the question that
has remained overlooked for several decades.
The litmus test
for a sane, credible, fair and democratic treaty lies in providing
treatment for permanent water-logging that has come to characterize the
Kosi region.
Floods
or Earthquakes or hurricanes or tornadoes or tsunamis cannot be
controlled. But the catastrophe they can cause be predicted, anticipated
and preventable. If that is the case the best flood proofing mechanism
since times immemorial is rely on simple truths and beware of the law of
unintended consequences. The simple truths being drainage of the river
must remain sacrosanct come what may besides early preparedness, timely
evacuation of human and animal population and establishment of robust
public health system.
Given its distinct geo-morphological
features and complicated hydrological characters, Kosi is one of the
Himalayan rivers that has yet to be understood in its entirety. There is
no substitute of reversing the past policies, as is being done world
over to combat adverse planetary changes. Land use changes such those
attempted in the past and those proposed are acknowledged to be
significant contributor to it. It is high time policy makers gave up
their outdated "conquest over nature" paradigm and acknowledge "we shall
have to learn to live with floods".
Instead
of pretending to be surprised by river's natural functions, scientific
logic of water cycle creates a compulsion for re-visiting the Kosi
Agreement to factor in fragility of Himalayan watershed, Ganga Basin
Master Plan, decommissioning of numerous dams in Europe, South America,
USA, and China and the UN report "Aging Water Infrastructure: An
Emerging Global Risk".
Besides recognising the rights and duties of the
riparian parties, the revised legal agreement will have to ensure that
the natural right of the river is recognized the way it has been done
in rights of rivers Brazil, Panama, Colombia, Bolivia, Mexico, Ecuador,
New Zealand, Uganda, Canada, Northern Ireland and Bangladesh. Unless
primacy is accorded to the legal rights of Kosi river, human suffering
due to drainage crisis will remain a permanent feature of the river
basin as an outcome of a myopic and misplaced "temporary" engineering
"solution".
Dr. Gopal Krishna
--
The author is Co-author, Report of Peoples' Commission on Kosi River Basin (February 2023), Member, Peoples' Commission on Kosi River Basin (2022), Co-author, Kosi Deluge: The Worst is Still to Come (September 2008), Member, Fact Fact Finding Mission on Kosi River Basin (March 2008) and Co-author, Disputes Over Ganga (2004)
