ONE DAM TWO STATES AND THREE RIVERS 7

TOWER OF BABEL

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The Tower of Babel

11 Now the whole world had one language and a common speech.

 2 As people moved eastward,they found a plain in Shinar and settled there.

3 They said to each other, “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly.” They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar

. 4 Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves; otherwise we will be scattered over the face of the whole earth.”

5 But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower the people were building. 

6 The Lord said, “If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. 

7 Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.”

8 So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city.

 9 That is why it was called Babel—because there the Lord confused the language of the whole world. From there the Lord scattered them over the face of the whole earth.( Bible gateway .com)

ONE DAM TWO STATES AND THREE RIVERS

TWO STATES

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There were more than 560 small kingdoms in India. 

They were in war with each other . 

Mughal emperors ruled this country for more than 400 years .

Then the Britishers for more than 200 years . 

The Merchants of East India company ,Came ,Saw and Conquered. 

They got permission to do trading from the Mughal .

The  battle of Plassey laid down the foundation of rising British Empire in India.

The clerk of East India Company became one of the richest persons  in England .  How ?

One of the Biggest states of India , Bengal, was divided in to Two . East and West. Muslims were the Majority in East Bengal .

Hindus were the Majority in West Bengal. 

The poisonous seed of religious fanaticism was sown .

Bombay , Calcutta, Madras gave way to the growth of British Empire .

They struck the Mughal Empire down to pieces when  Mughal kings were weak. 

Hindus , Muslims , Dalits all together worked together for getting Independence  .

British divided the nation in to two , Pakistan and India and gave to the people . 

They allowed the individual kingdoms like ,Travancore , Hyderabad ,and Kashmir decide themselves to join either of the two domains . 

By doing so they created a chaos and confusion amongs the Indian union and the Princely States .

At the stroke of the Midnight on August 14 th 1947 the tricolor flag was raised and the British flag down .

India was given Independence .

NEHRU'S Headache started. 

Sriramulu potti was on hunger strike for getting a separate state for Andra Pradesh .

Government was forced accept the demand but Sriramulu had to sacrifice his life for that .

Madras state was divided and Telugu speaking Andra Pradesh was born . 

It was Congress party's promise to form linguistic State . But Nehru was not much interested for such a proposal. 

But the agitation for Andra Pradesh has paved way for clam our from others also to form separate states on linguistic basis . 

A state reorganization committee was formed . 

November First 1956 , states were reorganized on linguistic basis. 

Kerala lost Tamil speaking area of Kanyakumari .

Kerala gained Malayalam speaking Kasargode from Kannada . 

ONE DAM TWO STATES AND THREE RIVERS -5

CHAPTER -II 

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ONE DAM

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It is known as Periyar dam in Tamilnadu .

 It is called Mullapperiyar dam in Kerala . 

Both name denotes the same dam .

It is a Dam built in Masonry . 

It is a gravity dam . 

It is situated in Kerala State . 

It feeds to the needs of Tamilnadu State. 

The Dam is having a maximum height of 155 feet. 

The Parappet is another 3 feet high . 

Initially water was stored till 152 ' . 

But the sudden and flash flood waters threatened to overflow the dam .

 Overflowing is detrimental to the safety of the dam .

The leaks were found as early as the beginning of twentieth century .

It was found lot of lime-surki mortar of the core concrete have been leached away.

Guniting were tried even during the British period  ( before independence ) .

This ONE DAM paved way to a series of dams to be built in the West flowing rivers. 

 This ONE DAM   INTRODUCED TO  TAMILNADU THE IDEA OF  INTERBASIN TRANSFER OF WATER. 

This ONE DAM which was originally intended to serve for irrigation purpose was later gave way for energy production also. 

This ONE DAM PAVED WAY FOR ARBITRATION BETWEEN   TWO NEIGBOURING STATES ,THE THEN TRAVANCORE STATE AND MADRAS  STATE. 

This ONE DAM gave the credit to One Tamilian Diwan ( Sir.C.P?Ramaswamy Iyer ) to win the case against Tamilnadu. 

But The then Madras Presidency went ahead of producing Power. 

Now THIS ONE DAM has become the eyesore of the politicians of TWO STATES. 

Kerala and Tamilnadu. 

ONE DAM TWO STATES AND THREE RIVERS -4

Conflicts inflicted by colonial Rule 

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India did not get independence. 

India was given independence . 

But ...

The One India was partitioned and Pakistan was born .

Indian kingdoms were given a choice by the Britishers to join either with Pakistan or India .

Kashmir King  ,Hyderabad Nizam , Travancore Maharaja wanted to be separate .

Vallabahai Patel , the iron man , ironed out the differences . 

Kashmir was given special status . 

Mullapperiyar lease agreement became controversial . 

British created problem by dividing India . 

They created problem by uniting the Tamil speaking North , and Sinhala speaking south of Srilanka . 

They draw a line On Map between India and China .Macmohan line 

All these are still giving trouble to the world . 

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ONE DAM TWO STATES AND THREE RIVERS 3

West goes to East 

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Madura, the South Indian city,has many stories to tell.

The land was reeling under seviour drought .

Prayers yielded .

Lord Siva asked Parvathy to keep her hand on the land .

From there erupted the River Vaikai

Vai ( tamil ) keep down 

Kai ( tamil ) hand 

Vaikai ( keep hand ) 

So the name Vaikai ( Vaigai) for the river running through the land , Madura.

Vaigai River is the Main Water Resource for entire Earstwhile Madura District , which includes the present day Ramnad district also. 

Ramnad kingdom was devoid of even drinking water. 

The minister of Ramnad under the direction of King tried for diverting water from Mullai ar, but in vain. 

During the British rule , Madura went under severe  drought.

Under the instruction from the government , the Executive Engineer , investigated for a water project.

He climbed up the eastern side of the western ghat . 

He came across the Suruli ar. He went further deep in the forest ,high above and reached the ridge . 

Wow! 

On the western side of western ghat flows a perineal river with abundant water. 

But the area lies on another Kingdom .

Travancore and Cochin was the two kingdoms lying on the western side of western ghats. 

Thinking the river flows through Cochin , he wrote a letter to the ruler of Cochin .

Then he got a reply that the river Periyar flows through Travancore  . 

He then approached the Travancore kingdom for diversion of water of Periyar .

This kingdom was under the supervision of Resident of British rulers .

British Army helped Maharaja of Venad to win the war of Kulachal .

The Dutch traders were defeated by Venad Maharaja ,

Raja of Travancore has to part with his lifeline of water of Periyar with the British rulers of Madras . 

That was history 

 The project to divert west flowing water to east started thus. 

ONE DAM TWO STATES AND THREE RIVERS

Dams,Dams everywhere 

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 India is one of the four countries which have dams everywhere. 

United States , China and Japan are the other front runners in the Dam construction Industry. 

A rough calculation gives the statistic as below.

China has 25000 big dams , United States of America 10000, India 5000 and japan 4500. 

It can be said " Dams ,Dams ,Everywhere ,but not a drop to quench the thirst of lands" 

The famine in India during the nineteenth

 century, made the British to institute the first Irrigation  commission in 1901 .

The famine killed lakhs and lakhs of people in  India .

The British rulers were blamed for not taking any positive action for averting the disaster. 

It prompted them to establish The first Irrigation Commission India .

The Report 1901-03 have suggested development of Irrigation  infrastructures. 

Even before that there were instances of building Dams by British Royal  engineers. 

Between  communication development and irrigation development ,initially the British preferred the first.

The developed the Railway net work . 

This was made to transport the  plundering materials to their land . 

But the boost for Irrigation Development came after the great famine .

One of the Dams built earlier in South India ,in the then, Madras Province has left an imbroglio of conflict between the two neighboring States of Independent India . 

The " Periyar  Project " completed by British Engineers became an eyesore .

Divide and Rule 

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British East India Company came to India for trading. 

They pleased the then rulers, Mughal,  and got permission .

At a time when the Mughal Empire was at its low ebb, they captured the power . 

It is history. 

The Triumphant  march started from 1757. 

Robert  Clive won the war at Plassey. 

There after East India Company did not looked back .

Every step was towards success. 

The Merchants became the Rulers . 

The sepoy mutiny as described by the British historians and first Indian Independence Struggle as told by Indian historians was in 1857, after a century of the  Plassey war. 

The traders trick to sustain their business was seen when they divided the greater Bengal ,into East Bengal and West Bengal , in line with the religious faith .

The seed of hate was sown in the minds of Indian .

Hindus and. Muslims were living happily with love ,now they turned against each other . 

That is history .

West goes to East 

ONE DAM, TWO STATES AND THREE RIVERS

ONE DAM ,TWO STATES, THREE RIVERS
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CHAPTER I
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INTRODUCTION
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" DAMS ARE TEMPLES OF MODERN INDIA "
Pandit Jawaharlaal Nehru ,the first Prime minister of India said so.
Food as a weapon
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India is basically an agriculture country.
She is blessed with many rivers, lakes and lagoons .
At the time of Independence ,the main responsibility of the rulers of  India were to provide food,clothes and shelter to the 400 million people in India .
The then Prime minister flew towards the west first but the reception was not much encouraging ,then he flew to east .
He was attracted by the ' Planned economy ' followed in U.S.S.R.
He came to India . Started  ' Five Year Plans ' for development.
Plan budget was suffering due to paucity of funds .
First  five year plan commenced in the year 1951.
Irrigation and Agriculture development was given the topmost priority.
By the fag end of the five first five year plan came the help from United States of America. U. S  policy makers feared India will be slipping into the hands of Socialist group ,if not helped for its economic development .
It gave some food for thought to the US foreign policy makers .
The Congress was not in favor of India ,but the Presidents were .
India doesn't want food for free . But as a loan .
It was acceptable to them .
The agreement for food Aid ,known as PL 480 ,was signed between India and U.S.
It was in 1954 when D.Eisenhower was the President of America .
Pakistan was given war weapons ,but India Economic  Aid (in the form of food ).
The food given to India was used, as a weapon,  to curtail the growth of communism in India .
The arrangement is like this .
1136 crores worth of food materials is to be supplied to India inclusive of the cost of  shipment.
India can sell it and the money can be used for budget .
The first five year plan gave importance to build Irrigation Infrastructures ,like Dams, Reservoirs , Canals , etc..