A state government that has unfailingly sponsored bandhs to protestagainst the economic blockade of Cuba has, surprisingly, been low key about the dangerlurking in its own backyard. All-party delegations to the Centre, unanimous resolutions inthe state assembly and the occasional visit by a central team have been the only signs ofofficial recognition of what is perhaps the gravest threat to post-Independence Bengal.Says Rabi Ghosh, lecturer in a Calcutta college who hails from Berham-pur: "The humanfactor has always played a role in natural calamities in eastern India. They blamed humangreed for the famine. If Murshidabad goes under, human negligence will beresponsible."
Says Sunil Munsi, president of the Geographical Society of India: "There’sa lobby which claims our territory is affected by the protection work undertaken by theBangla authorities on their side. But this is yet to be proved. Who has prevented us fromprotecting our side? There are 54 rivers flowing through the two countries. Rightly orwrongly, Bangladesh insists the Farakka barrage has led to the desertification of largetracts of cultivable land on their side. Instead of a dialogue, we have a deadlock. Wherecoordination and constant monitoring is called for, there’s distrust andarbitrariness."
Over the past few years, an estimated 480 sq km of land has been eroded by the Bhagirathiin Murshidabad alone. And Munsi would rather not bank on just hope. "To begin with,1.3 km is too close for comfort, as hydrological changes are hard to predict. The factthat it’s been like this for the last three years means little...three years arenothing. We should have initiated measures long before the two rivers were thisclose."
The politics of the issue, of course, emphasises other aspects. An all-party team headedby Chief Minister Basu, in a recent memo submitted to the Centre, noted not just thethreat of calamity but "the dimension of the loss of Indian territory toBangladesh". It says: "The left bank of the Padma downstream of Nimtita (20 kmdownstream of the Farakka barrage) is in Bangladesh. So any loss of land on the right bankmeans a permanent loss of Indian territory."
Under international law, when a river is mutually accepted as the boundary betweentwo countries, the border is the line running through the middle of the stream. If theriver shifts (in this case both the shift of the Ganga and the accompanying erosion helpBangladesh), the authorities usually work out the old alignments again to ensure thatneither side benefits unduly from unpredictable natural processes. In actuality, however,human settlements come up on both sides, as does cultivation. And though encroachment isnot an issue initially, local tensions are inevitable in due course.