Kosi

Members of Parliament from Uttarakhand had a meeting with the Hon’ble Minister for Environment and Forests to discuss the matter. The projects have been appraised and approved by the Ministry’s Environmental Appraisal Committees and the Forest Appraisal Committee, after which the decision has been taken.

The projects that have been cleared include:

• Collection of stone, boulders and other minor minerals from 1497 ha area in river bed of Gola river till the end of next working season i.e. till 31.5.2012

Forwarded to the portal by: Sudhirendar Sharma

Those activists, practitioners and journalists who have travelled in the Kosi River basin during 2008 (before the Kushaha breach), 2009 and 2010 have helped enhance our collective understanding on a manmade crises of gigantic proportions. Though not pre-planned, a unique fellowship on Kosi has indeed developed over these years. In their respective domains, each of the fellows have/are contributing to taking the key learnings across for better understanding on how our land, rivers and water ought to be managed (or not managed). The task, however, is far from finished.

This document titled “From Policy to Practice” is a process documentation of Water and Energy Commission Secretariat (WECS) and World Wildlife Fund’s (WWF) joint initiative for the first field piloting of Integrated Water Resource Management (IWRM) approach as prioritized by the National Water Plan 2005 in Koshi River Basin, Nepal.

This pictoral document explains the effort to translate policy into practice by showcasing Koshi River Basin Management Program as a model for conservation and wise use of water and its resources to secure life and livelihoods of generations to come by addressing the impacts of climate change.

When the foundation stone for the Kosi embankment was laid on January 14, 1955, near Nirmali in Saharsa district in Bihar, euphoric people shouted, Aadhi roti khayenge, Kosi bandh banayenge (we will eat only half a chapati but we will surely build the embankment), writes the prolific engineer and activist Dinesh Mishra in his book, “ Trapped! Between the Devil and the Deep Waters.” No one really paid any attention to the protests and the fears of the people who would live with these embankments and what would happen to their lives.

PMO FORWARDS PETITION ON KOSI TRAGEDY TO HOME MINISTRY FOR APPROPRIATE ACTION

Prof.Suraj Yadav, Assistant Professor in Delhi University reports

Patna, Jan 15 (PTI) The Principal Accountant General (PAG) of Bihar has indicted the state government for the breach in river Kosi embankment in 2008 that rendered lakhs of people homeless and claimed several lives.

A fraud in Kosi flood relief distribution has landed a government official in trouble in Bihar's Supaul district.

As many as 286 cheques allegedly went missing from the office of the block development officer (BDO) of Chhatapur in the district.

Like majority of our rivers, Kosi too is a goddess - the daughter of Lord Shiva. Nicknamed `the sorrow of Bihar' by the male-dominated engineer-contractor -politician lobby, the river has been searching for its identity ever since. Ironically, most of what has been seen and written on the hydrological engineering imposed on the river has been by `men' only.

The following reports are from interactions organized in and around the Kosi Basin on the initiative of the Barh Mukti Abhiyan in alliance with local organizations. Reports from the interactions offer an unique window to the continued effect of the Kosi deluge and also the current local concerns in the field.