Hand picked team

Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee recently added five more members to the task force that has been entrusted with the job of linking the nation's rivers. They are R K Pachauri, director, Tata Energy Research Institute; K Kasturirangan, chairperson, Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO); K V Kamath, chief executive officer, ICICI Bank; Deepak Dasgupta, former chairperson of National Highways Authority of India and G C Sahu, former chief engineer, Orissa government.

Pachauri, who is also the chairperson of the International Panel on Climate Change, will address the environmental aspects of the project. Hopefully, he will be given space to manoeuvre this time around. (It may be recalled that he resigned from the Godbole Committee on Enron because of certain reservations.) Kasturirangan's selection is relevant, as the project will depend heavily on ISRO's satellite pictures.

Dasgupta would be expected to repeat his highway heroics and Kamath's previous stint at the Asian Development Bank (ADB) might just make the project's access to its coffers that much easier.

Sahu will try to smoothen the flow of Mahanadi waters to Godavari river and further on till Cauvery river.