The Government of India, on directions from the Supreme Court in 2002 and advice from the National Water Development Agency (NWDA), proposed an estimated US$120 billion National River Linking Project (NRLP) which envisages linking 37 Himalayan and Peninsular rivers (Figure 1; NCIWRD 1999). Doing this will form a gigantic South Asian water grid which will annually handle 178×109 m3/yr of interbasin water transfer; build 12,500 km of canals; generate 34 gigawatts of hydropower; add 35 million hectares (Mha) to India’s irrigated areas; and generate inland navigation benefits (IWMI 2003; NWDA 2006; Gupta and van der Zaag 2007)
