More details have come out about India’s national river linking project. Around 30 river link canals are to be dug up in the north and south, 3000 storages are to be constructed, 37 rivers will be connected, and a gigantic water grid will be formed to potentially change the face of South Asia. Internally, India will benefit greatly. When monsoon rains come, the interconnected barrages will take the surplus water to the rivers that are dry, the country will cope with droughts and floods simultaneously, canals will be used as water ways for navigation, reducing stress on other means of transportation, the growing irrigation demand for food crops will be met, safe drinking water will be made available to everyone, hydroelectricity will be generated and arable land availability will take a quantum leap. In addition, in just a thousand working days a huge crop of skilled workforce will be created, trained to take over the world of infrastructure development by storm. Soon most infrastructural and hydraulic development projects all over the world will be taken over by this Indian skilled force, giving India a new economic standing in the international market. Our unskilled expatriate work force will not stand a chance against them. Will this not have an adverse effect of overseas remittances. It is no longer a matter of choice, it is a matter of our survival. Pakistan must match the Indian effort if it is to survive as an agricultural country. How it can best be done is up to the experts to decide but we need a single river basin as much as India needs it.
ENGR KHURSHID ANWER,
Lahore, March 5.