Minister of State for Water Resources, River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation Vijay Goel has called for timely implementation of projects. Chairing the Eleventh meeting of the Special Committee for Inter-Linking of Rivers held in New Delhi today the Minister said that mutual consent is necessary for smooth implementation of projects. He said interlinking of rivers is an attempt to boost the surplus water availability to the needy states. The Minister said, for this we will require a detailed study of country’s agricultural land including irrigated land, non-irrigated land, agricultural produce and their market. Resources Shri Goel expressed the hope that National Water Development Agency will work with more vigour and will complete the delayed inter linking projects in a time bound manner.”
The meeting confirmed the minutes of the 10th meeting of the Special Committee for Interlinking of Rivers held on 26th July, 2016 at New Delhi. It also reviewed the Follow-up action on the decisions taken during the last meeting. The other issues taken up included Ken-Betwa Link Project Phase-I-Status of various statutory clearances, Ken-Betwa Link Project Phase –II – Present status of DPR , Damanganga-Pinjal and Par-Tapi-Narmada Link Projects – Present status of DPRs System Simulation Studies of Mahanadi-Godavari, Surplus Water in River Basin for Interlinking of Rivers, Status of Intra-State link proposals, Restructuring of National Water Development Agency.
Union Cabinet in its meeting held on July 24, 2014 approved the constitution of the Special Committee on ILR. Accordingly, Special Committee on ILR was constituted vide order dated September 23, 2014. The first meeting of the committee was held on October 17, 2014 and its last meeting was held on April 29, 2016. The committee, after considering the views of all the stakeholders, is proceeding ahead to expedite the objectives of the interlinking of rivers as per terms of reference. Vigorous efforts have been made for generating consensus with development of alternative plans and also setting out road maps for implementation of projects.