The Protest against Ken-Betwa River linking Project 💧

Hello readers 👋

Along with the student protest, there are at least ten other protests taking place across the country. This one caught my attention because there's something fundamentally wrong with the way it's being casually mentioned in Instagram reels that list all the ongoing protests.

It is NOT the Ken-Betwa protest. It is a protest AGAINST THE KEN-BETWA RIVER LINKING PROJECT.

People really need to get their grammar right because, in this case, it changes the entire meaning. Calling it the "Ken-Betwa protest" makes it sound as though people are protesting against the rivers themselves, when in reality they are protesting against a government project that seeks to link them.

Although the protest has never really made it to the headlines of major news channels or newspapers, for reasons that are obvious, as it apparently seems more important for citizens to know about India's candy exports, the latest Melody melodrama, or the history of jhalmuri than about issues like these.

The government also did not consider it necessary to obtain the consent of the tribal communities living in the area where the Daudhan Dam is to be constructed. These communities have lived on this land for generations long before there was a government in India.

They finalized the project,began the construction, but over 6,600 families from the indigenous Gond and Kol tribe are being displaced from their homes due to the construction of the Daudhan Dam.

Thousands of these tribal women considered lying on symbolic funeral pyres, because they thought doing it this way was the only language left for the government to understand. 

It's called the Chita Andolan.

They've also been doing the Jal Satyagrah where they stand in between the flowing river and the Faansi Satyagraha where they've fake hung themselves showing how it feels being displaced from your homes again and again, and how it's something worse than death.

             Chhatarpur; picture credit: instagram 

 Picture credit: instagram-worldheadlinenews24 

Imagine feeling that leaving your home is so unbearable that you'd rather symbolically attend your own funeral than watch your village disappear underwater.

Do you not think this deserves more attention than it's getting (which is none by the mainstream media)

Lemme tell you what exactly the Ken-Betwa Project is. Let's go back a little, as we always should🙂‍↕️

In 1980 to be precise, the government came up with an ambitious dream to link India's rivers so that water rich basins could help droughtprone ones (sounded extremely logical to me till now🤷‍♀️)

And Ken-Betwa Link happens to be the first project under this plan. They're going to do it for 30 more rivers btw.

The idea is simple (on paper), build the Daudhan Dam on the Ken River, transfer what the government calls "surplus" water through a 221km canal into the Betwa River, and provide irrigation and drinking water across Bundelkhand. It is spread across parts of Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh, has struggled with droughts, crop failures and migration for decades. 

Naturally, any project promising water sounds like a blessing in this case.

The government says the project will irrigate over ten lakh hectares of farmland 😃and provide drinking water to more than six million people. Pretty impressive numbers fr🌟, but numbers rarely tell the whole story because to build the Daudhan Dam, over two million trees are expected to be cut, nearly majority of the area of the Panna Tiger Reserve (for the construction of which the tribals here had already migrated once)would go underwater.

              picture credit: Pugdundee safaris

Conservationists have repeatedly warned that you cannot save tigers by destroying the very forest they live in (they forgot to say, "you dumbshits")

Around 6,600 tribal families are also expected to lose their homes and for them this displacement is worse that death.Many of these Gond and Kol families have already experienced displacement once before because of the Panna Tiger Reserve, which is also gonna go down the drain(river in this case) because of the project 

Imagine rebuilding your life after being literally uprooted once, only to hear, "Sorry, we need your land again."

No doubt they call this situation worse than death.

The government does offer compensation of about ₹12.5 lakh per acre and money for housing but tribals say that money cannot replace the mahua flowers and tendu leaves that they used and were a part of their living, the medicinal plants present there, their community and their IDENTITY will be lost and can never be compensated.

A cheque cannot compensate for a way of life right?!

It does not just have an emotional angle to this, there's a logical angle too (for the non philosophy ones)

Does the Ken River even have what the government loves to call "surplus" water? 

uhmmm...NO

Researchers and river experts say that the data which proves this surplus has never been independently verified.

             The ken river: picture credit TIT

If the river itself doesn't consistently have extra water, then what exactly is being transferred?

Scientists also warn that cutting millions of trees to build the link could actually reduce local rainfall over time. I mean come on you don't need to be a scientist to know that.

Ironically, a project built to fight drought could end up making drought worse.

It's almost like a rich man donating money to a beggar (who has a hole in his pocket) until his pockets are filled. The rich man's gonna end up being a beggar too.(expensive gamble💸)

what is surprising is the fact that Bundelkhand already knows how to manage water.

(wait WHAT? and the beggar knows how to earn??)

well in the history, before there were any engineers, the rulers of these places, the Chandela and Bundela rulers had built thousands of ponds, tanks and water harvesting structures across the region.

Many still exist. They're simply neglected.

Infact they've also tried doing it with an old dam in the village, it was restored by removing years of accumulated silt and farmers immediately observed better crop yields. In another initiative, Kol tribal families built dozens of farm ponds and small check dams.

Within a few years, wheat production increased dramatically, groundwater also improved for that matter and migration reduced because farming started becoming profitable again.

N. massive displacement or flooded tiger reserve or biggy big dams. Just local people managing local water, as simple as that.

Sometimes the old solutions survive because they actually worked.

         Bundelkhand: picture credit: india.com

But then.... why is the government still pushing the project? the biggest question obviously.

The thing is.... large infrastructure projects are politically attractive. Flashy big dam project pamphlets ✨️

that way you can inaugurate a dam.You can cut a ribbon.You can announce thousands of crores worth of investment.

On the other hand restoring old ponds, repairing check dams and strengthening watershed management isn't exactly headline material na. No ribbon cutting ceremonies for the pookies🎀

It requires constant maintenance, you cannot just make one grand announcement, pass the tender on to the contractor who can give you the most chanda for your elections, in the name of electoral bonds.

Another reason is that governments often prefer engineering solutions because they're measurable.

A dam has a height.

A canal has a length.

A project has a budget.

But measuring healthier groundwater, stronger local communities and revived traditional knowledge isn't as glamorous, even if it's more sustainable.

In our country, or anywhere for that matter, development has become synonymous with building something bigger and rarely with repairing what already exists.

Soo...can Bundelkhand solve its water crisis without the Ken-Betwa Project?

Maybe not entirely let's be fair. Bundelkhand's water crisis is real, no doubt climate change has made rainfall increasingly unpredictable.The region certainly needs investment.

But the real question was never whether Bundelkhand needs water or not,it obviously does.

The question is whether one giant project should replace hundreds of proven local solutions and maybe the answer isn't choosing between tradition and technology, why cannot we use both??

Restore ancient tanks and also build check dams for the same. Watershed management can be strengthened, and only then ask whether a river linking project is still necessary. We've also learned about rainwater harvesting in our textbooks, but we've never really seen it being used irl, why?? It's far more cheaper and sustainable. Why are we so interested in building dams, I can never get it.

Development shouldn't mean asking forests, wildlife and indigenous communities to pay the entire bill.

How materialistic do you have to be to not see what the tribals are going through, the fact that they call this worse than death. Their Chita Andolan, Jal Satyagrah, Faansi Satyagraha which they've been doing since april is nowhere to be seen on the mainstream news channels on tv, it's so sad to see that they're not even being seen.

The activist who led this protest, Amit Bhatnagar after his 14day hunger strike is also taken by the police just like the way they took Sonam Wangchuk in the name of health issues. No freedom of speech or protest is left in this country. Media has no freedom left too. I wonder if anything will ever change.

what kind of development are we celebrating that’s making the government go for these flashy big dam projects than going for more sustainable alternatives is what I will never understand.

Explain if you can or feel free to disagree or contradict with me in the comments below.

That's the whole point of writing these blogs :)