In years that the Kosi river floods in Bihar, government officials from Delhi and Patna rush to observe the river’s “wrath” from high-flyin...
In years that the Kosi river floods in Bihar, government officials from Delhi and Patna rush to observe the river’s “wrath” from high-flying helicopters. Inevitably, political leaders, bureaucrats and sections of the media delude the Indian public by blaming Nepal for releasing water.
Then, they announce that they have the answer to save the people: the Saptakosi High Dam, to be built in Nepal, and its deep reservoir, which will end the flooding forever. The geopolitical pressure from Patna and New Delhi will be such that Kathmandu’s rulers will find it difficult to resist the pressure.
But as the first part of this series explained, the answer is nowhere as simple. The floods are the result of the ill-conceived Kosi embankment project completed in 1959, which has dramatically raised the height of the riverbed by trapping silt within the confines of the eastern and western levees.
The monsoon passes, the waters recede, media attention shifts, but the silt keeps accumulating, and the Kosi riverbed keeps rising. But before long, the Kosi will break out massively, and there will be pralaya, the only equivalent of which can be the 2004 tsunami and its swamping of populated coastlines around the Indian Ocean.
The high dam idea has not been universally accepted, including in...
