Rahul Mehta Gandhinagar LsCandidate

1. Increasing height of Narmada dam is good step
2. Narmada dam - so late, so little
3. Where will Govt get money for projects across India?
4. Lets not praise leaders for increase in electricity power generation
5. Hype of holy river cleaning
6. LTC scam --- cheap trict to get MPs' support in Rajyasabja
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1. Increasing height of Narmada dam
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Displacement of 250,000 could be over-estimate. But even if 250,000 poorest of the poorest are to be displaced, then a compensation of inflation adjusted Rs 1000 per month per person lifelong should be sufficient. This will cost Rs 25 crore per month , Rs 300 crore for year and no more than Rs 9000 crore for next 30 years. Plus value of the immovable property they will lose. All in all, the value of electricity and water obtained exceeds the costs. Now Rs 1000 per person per month may be low, but for a REAL poor, it is a lot.
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Now problems will be --- there is no proper list of persons who were actually living there. Many living there wont be in the list, andb many who never lived there will now pop up in list. The compensation is often a large amount one time, and not monthly. Those who get large amount have to first give some bribes before they get compensation. IOW, problem is NOT displacement but usual lack of records and corruption. And they end up blowing away all the money in marriage eyc and then are back to petty menial labor. Thats why monthly cash is better than one time large amount.
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Dams are cheapest source of electricity, far cheaper than solar. China is ahead of us, and a tailing reason is cheaper electricity. And reason is that China gets a big chunk of electricity from hydro. And dam electricity causes least pollution.
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2. Narmada dam -- so little. so late
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Narmada dam was proposed in mid 1940s by Bhaikaka , the legendary civil engineer of Gujarat. The foundation stone was laid in 1956, and dam project would have been completed by 1064. But plethora of foreigners paid judges, tribunal heads etc to impose one after another stay orders on baseless causes. And dam's height, even after approved raise, is some 15% LESS than what Bhaikaka had suggested in 1940s. IOW, in 1940s it was possible to build a much taller dam. Instead of blaming and fixing the messed up judiciary which blocked the dam for decades, we are "celebrating" the arrival of "permission", as if some real war has been won.
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3. Hype of river cleaning.
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The water that comes into river from source, such as pond or glacier is always clean. So keeping river clean is easy --- just dont throw dirt in it !! Just clean the sewer water and factory water before throwing it back into river.
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If we dont throw dirty water in river, then the river will always remain clean . And once we throw dirty water in river, and then NOTHING can clean river till that water goes into ocean which takes weeks to travel. And if we keep throwing dirty water in river everyday, then river can never be cleaned. And once we stop throwing dirty water, river will become clean in weeks. IOW, there is NO such thing as river cleaning, it s only sewer cleaning !! The projects should be called as "[CITY] Sewer Water Cleaning Projects" where CITY is the name of the city\town along river.
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And all financial as well administrative responsibility should be on city itself. And the financial as well administrative responsibility of cleaning factory water too should be imposed on factory owners only. The Govt should NOT get involved into it, except punishing those who throw chemical water in river.
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All in all, for past 30 years, "sewer cleaning projects" are hyped up and touted as "Holy river cleaning projects", as if rivers source was dirty and river water is being cleaned !!! And now what we see is much grand version of this hype --- projects worth 1000s of crores or rupees, a new Ministry, foreign companies and what not !! All this to remove sewer dirt using technology that is over 100 years old, and removing chemicals which is also decades old.
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4. Lets not praise leaders for electricity power production.
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Praising Govts and leaders for increase in electricity power in past 10 years needs to end. That would be like praising leaders and Dhirubhai for increase in cellphone usage in India. We all have cellphones because Americans made these cellphones, and Chinese made them cheaper. .
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Same way, power generation in India in past 10 years increased because of the cost of solar power generation reduced. and the cost reduced because of Americans made advancements in solar panels and Chinese made them cheaper. And cost of coal based plant of also reduced, because cost of equipment after inflation adjustment has reduced, and skills to install them has become plentiful.
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Praising Govts and leaders for power generation reminds me of 1990s, when some people used to praise PVNR\MMS for phenomenal increase in India's software exports, STD booths etc.
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5. LTC scam --- a new chapter in the same book of "using of CBI to get votes in Rajyasabha"
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The LTC scam of six MPs runs into few lakhs. All MPs put together dont cross even one crore. So basically, NaMo's goal in chasing these MPs isnt scam per se, but to force MPs to support his legislations in Rajyasabha. If the goal was to have a "scam mukt bharat", then NaMo wont waste time in chasing such chickenfeeds and would rather chase elephants in Supreme court, high courts, ex-Ministers, IAS, IPS etc. So UPA got support of MPs via CBI, and same dirty tricks are continuing. And NaMo has a good excuse "Congress ne bhi to 60 saal tak wahi kiyaa hei". (Congress has done same for 60 years).
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Now as long as NaMo confines these dirty tricks to MPs, I wont complain much. Because all MPs have been using such dirty tricks against each other since 1950s. The victim MPs can file PIL on SZI affidavit issue and get back. But I hope NaMo wont use these CBI\IT dirty tricks on small private citizens. Because small private citizens never had any power to act dirty, and so they have never acted dirty. So dirty tricks should NOT be used against small private citizens.
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- by Rahul Chimanbhai Mehta , Right to recall Group, 11-jun-2014
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(please copy-paste and pls dont share/like, as notifications disturb me.. Please share only if you have phone which doesnt support copy-paste.).
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