http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-opinion/a-visionary-on-water-issues/article7643393.ece
“Rivers are not human artifacts; they are natural phenomena, integral
components of ecological systems, and inextricable parts of the
cultural, social, economic and spiritual lives of the communities
concerned. They are not pipelines to be cut, turned around, welded and
rejoined.”
Ramaswamy R. Iyer, water policy expert who wrote extensively for The
Hindu , saw rivers not as pipelines to be cut and welded, but as
inextricable parts of the lives of communities
Ramaswamy R. Iyer passed away on September 9 in Delhi after a severe
bout of viral fever. The water policy expert, who last held the position
of an honorary research professor at the Centre for Policy Research,
earlier served as Secretary of Water Resources in the Central
government. Iyer’s passion for water-related issues won him the Padma
Shri in 2014.
Besides being a policy expert, Iyer was also a fine writer. He wrote
several books, and the last one titled /Living Rivers, Dying Rivers/
(Oxford University Press, 2015) signifies the very cause he wrote
extensively and indefatigably about. In the introduction to the book, he
explains the reason for the title, also adding a few words of warning:
“When the title was initially thought of, the expectation was that the
chapters in the book would highlight both healthy rivers and sick
rivers, though not in equal numbers. However, it was found that most
chapters tended to present grim pictures of rivers in decline…Even the
few ‘living’ rivers (for instance, the Shastri river in Maharashtra and
Tamraparni in Tamil Nadu) are said to be under threat…Similarly the
rivers of North-East have remained relatively free-flowing and clean
(‘pristine’) because of the absence or limited nature of human
intervention, but that situation is changing. A large number of
hydroelectric projects are planned in the North-East and some are
already under construction….In particular, the most well known of them,
the Brahmaputra, is now the victim of project planning by both China and
India, with Bangladesh also involved in the controversy as the anxious
lower riparian…One shudders to think of... the consequences of
interventions in this river by the state, whether Chinese or India.”
The book was to be officially launched on September 7 at Vice-President
Hamid Ansari’s house, but Mr. Iyer’s ill-health stalled the programme.
Personally, I know just how deeply devoted he was to giving this book
its shape and how diligently he had worked on the idea (preceding the
book, he had given a lecture series at the India International Centre,
Delhi). Though he had been Secretary, Ministry of Water Resources, he
was unlike any average water bureaucrat. He consistently stood by the
idea — as he had written in his book, /Towards Water Wisdom: Limits,
Justice, Harmony/ — that in the Indian context the problem of water has
been a “crisis of gross mismanagement” and in the international context,
“a crisis of rapacity.” In the same book he wrote, “The theory that
‘development’ entails ‘costs’ and that this is a ‘sacrifice’ that some
must accept in order that others might benefit must be recognised to be
disingenuous and sanctimonious; it must be firmly abandoned. Pain and
hardship imposed by some on others cannot be described as a sacrifice by
the latter…‘Stakeholder consultation’ is another misleading and
sanctimonious formulation. Both the beneficiaries of big projects
(farmers receiving irrigation in the command area, industries and cities
getting electricity, etc.) and those lands, livelihoods, and
centuries-old access to the natural resource base are being taken away
are lumped together as ‘stakeholders’ who must be consulted. In truth,
the beneficiaries are stake-gainers whereas the project-affected groups
are stake-losers, and the primacy of the latter over the former needs to
be recognised…”
Again — “The engineering-dominated supply-side approach meant that
attention was focussed on what is referred to as water resource
development; the manner in which water was used or managed received
little attention… That view continues to hold sway in the Indian Water
Establishment. They see the problem in terms of (a) spatial variations
in the availability of water, and (b) a crisis looming on the horizon…
Their answer, once again, is more supply-side engineering.” ( /Towards
Water Wisdom/ )
Iyer’s opinions on the Indus Waters Treaty, the Cauvery water dispute,
the Mullaperiyar issue, the interlinking of Indian rivers project, are
well-known. He was one of the petitioners seeking a review of the
Supreme Court order on interlinking rivers project and he remained,
until the very end, one of its most vociferous critics. About
interlinking rivers, he had written: “Rivers are not human artifacts;
they are natural phenomena, integral components of ecological systems,
and inextricable parts of the cultural, social, economic and spiritual
lives of the communities concerned. They are not pipelines to be cut,
turned around, welded and rejoined.”
Iyer was always prompt in replying to emails. He was also encouraging of
people. I was fortunate that he not only penned one of the blurbs for my
book, but also discussed it (along with Professor Amita Baviskar) at an
event at India International Centre, on September 9 last year. While
speaking on my book, he shared his broader critique of the nature of
development, placing my book in the context of a longer debate on
displacement and relief and rehabilitation. Since the struggle of people
affected by the Sardar Sarovar Project (SSP) and other projects still
continues, I feel I must recount what Iyer said that day: “The
present…official and industry thinking seems to be that land should be
had for the asking. The average administrator…engineer and expert think
of the peasantry, the boatmen, the fisherfolk and others, particularly
tribal communities, as backward, needing to be brought into the
mainstream…They have no understanding of the pain of the displacement
that will remain in spite of the rehabilitation package, however good it
may be. From the perspective of development as currently understood,
Polavaram and other similar projects are symbols of development. In that
view, the disappearance of traditional societies and their centuries’
old relationship with nature will seem inevitable and necessary
transition to modernity. A person holding such a view will have little
time or patience for the agony and anguish experienced by the
dispossessed…” About the river he added, “The engineer thinks of it as a
feature of nature to be subdued, controlled and manipulated. Or pushed
around (as remarked by a famous American water manager); the economist
thinks of it as a commodity like any other, left to market forces. What
is common to all these perceptions is the reduction of the river to the
water that it carries. And an instrumentalist or utilitarian view of the
river.”
In a condolence message, several groups such as the National Alliance of
People’s movements , the Lokshakti Abhiyan, the Niyamgiri Suraksha
Samiti, the Kisan Sangharsh Samiti said of Iyer: “At Narmada Bachao
Andolan, we still remember how, as a key official in the Water Ministry,
way back in 1993, he patiently sat through the proceedings of the
five-Member Review Committee and worked as the Committee’s backbone,
painstakingly trying to understand and later convince himself and other
members of the costs and benefits of the SSP. The Report of the
five-Member Group is nothing short of a classic. We can never forget how
Iyer /ji/ stayed for the entire three days in the Narmada valley with
his family, during the mega events marking the 25 years of the struggle,
interacting and expressing solidarity with the tribals and farmers in
the hills and plains. As a petitioner before the Supreme Court in the
Narmada petition … he questioned the unconstitutionally of displacement
by offer of meagre cash compensation to the Sardar Sarovar oustees…”
/(R. Umamaheshwari is/ /fellow at the Indian Institute of Advanced
Study, Shimla.)/
/*The theory that ‘development’ entails ‘costs’ and that this is a
‘sacrifice’ that some must accept in order that others might benefit
must be firmly abandoned.*/
--
Gurumurthy Kasinathan
Director, IT for Change
In Special Consultative Status with the United Nations ECOSOC
www.ITforChange.Net| Cell:91 9845437730 | Tel:91 80 26654134, 26536890
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