Revision summary
The project would transfer water across Himalayan and peninsular basins. Features include large storage, canals and central–state bargaining. Agriculture could gain stable irrigation and some flood moderation. Benefits will follow existing land power unless designed otherwise. Ecology, displacement and ‘surplus’ labels are the main risks.
Model answer
Copper italics in this answer — like this — are the key facts. Each one is unpacked in the Facts & figures rail.
Introduction
The Inter-linking of Rivers project is a mega-engineering vision to move water from surplus to deficit basins through canals and dams. For agriculture it promises irrigation. Sociologically it also promises conflict over whose water and whose land.
Body
Main features
- A national water grid idea: Himalayan and peninsular components, storage, and transfer links.
- Central steering with state consent problems, because rivers are federal facts and cultures.
- Large civil works: reservoirs, canals, and power, in the lineage of planned irrigation after the Five-Year Plans.
- Environmental and displacement clearances as bottlenecks, especially in Adivasi and delta tracts.
Probable agrarian advantages
- Stabilised irrigation in drought-prone Deccan and western tracts could thicken a commercial kisan layer, as canals did in older command areas.
- Flood moderation in some donor basins and dry-season water in donee basins could cut crop failure.
- Navigable stretches and hydropower are side claims that may cheapen input movement.
Sociological cautions
- Advantages follow land: maliks and rich peasants drink first, as Thorner’s map still warns.
- Inter-state and intra-basin politics can turn a ‘national’ link into a water riot.
- Canal salinity, lost fisheries, and submerged villages can be a bane to agrarian classes who do not own the new command.
- Climate change makes ‘surplus basin’ a unstable label.
Balanced agrarian view
- Water where the field is thirsty is a real advantage if titles, ecology, and Gram Sabha consent travel with the canal.
Flow diagram
flowchart TD IL[River links dams canals] --> IR[Irrigation in deficit basins] IL --> D[Displacement inter-state conflict] L[Land class] --> W[Who drinks first]
Conclusion
Inter-linking features a national transfer grid of dams and canals. Probable agricultural advantages are irrigation stability and some flood control. Without class-fair distribution and ecological honesty, the project can reproduce Green Revolution inequality on a larger map.
Quick related
Students also ask
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Has Green Revolution led to the formation of new power elite in rural India? Elaborate your answer.
Next question on this syllabus topic (2018 · Q6(b)). View answer →
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Is more water always good for farmers?
Water without drainage and fair turns can mean salinity and fights.
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Does ILR replace local watershed work?
Mega links cannot replace tanks, soils, and village recharge.
Same topic · past papers
UPSC has asked this before
These previous-year questions sit on the same topic. Open one to practise the earlier ask.
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2018 · Q8(b) · Sociology GS 2 · 15 marks
Western patriarchy which surrenders feminine principles is the development project in India. Do you agree with this view? Why?
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