Скачать или смотреть India’s River Linking: Genius Idea or Monsoon Disaster?

India’s National River Linking Project (NRLP) aims to redirect 37 rivers in a $168B grid to move water from flood-prone basins to drought-hit regions. It sounds like an engineering miracle—but it could also change India’s monsoon.

In this video, Dr. Tejasvi Chauhan (Max Planck Institute) explains how large-scale transfers may trigger land–atmosphere feedback—the natural loop where evaporation and rainfall connect distant basins. With ~80% of India’s freshwater arriving via the monsoon, disrupting that balance could threaten farming, drinking water, and livelihoods. We also examine on-the-ground impacts (tiger habitat loss, millions of trees felled, potential displacement) and why a century-old plan is being fast-tracked today—plus smarter alternatives to capture rain where it falls.

What you’ll learn

How NRLP works (37 links, ~200 bcm moved annually) and why data is “state secret”

The science of recycled precipitation & monsoon temperature gradients

The first link (Ken–Betwa): submergence, forests, displacement trade-offs

Why climate policy lands differently in India (brown vs green agenda)

Decentralized fixes: rainwater harvesting and nature-based storage

India’s River Linking: Genius Idea or Monsoon Disaster:
00:00 Intro
01:11 What is the National River Linking Project?
02:16 “Top Secret”: flow data & geopolitics
02:42 Why is it so secret?
03:34 India’s long history of water disputes
06:34 A 100-year-old plan revived (PM Modi)
08:00 How rerouting rivers can change the weather
10:24 What happens when basins are force-linked
11:42 Impacts on land, wildlife, and people
13:36 Why this isn’t making headlines
15:09 Is climate policy a “first-world” luxury?
15:31 India’s push for a climate-forward future
16:31 If not interlinking, then what?
17:29 Why this matters to you
18:30 Earth Month: Episode 1/3 — subscribe for the series


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List of Resources & Further Reading Mentioned in this Video:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1U...

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#science #water #earth #india #riverlinking #megaprojects #climatechange #indusriver