Former Power Minister Suresh Prabhu has been assigned the job of realising Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee’s dream of linking 37 rivers. It’s a huge, Rs 5,60,000-crore project but Prabhu has already hit the first hurdle.The Finance Ministry has shot down his proposal to set up a secretariat with eight advisers and two full-time secretaries. The reason: There is a freeze on hiring and creation of new posts.The standoff continued so Prabhu had to ask the Prime Minister to intervene. The PMO has now asked the Finance Ministry to intervene and the Ministry of Personnel to sort out the problem even if it meant creation of posts on contract basis.Prabhu, heading the task force on linking of rivers, had sought two full-time joint-secretary-level officials for his secretariat as his work involved liaising with states and interaction with bureaucrats. He wanted independent experts on finance, ecology and environment, sociological issues, organisational skills, creation of awareness through maintaining websites, international cooperation with neighbouring countries like Bhutan and Nepal and on management.Finance Ministry’s Expenditure section put its foot down as its budgetary position was tight. Their justification: There was already a Ministry for Water Resources and a National Water Development Agency from where resources could be drawn. Prabhu, who has been given the rank of a Cabinet Minister, sought to underplay the problem: ‘‘It’s true that I had asked for a secretariat to support me and there was some problem initially, but the issue has now been resolved. I have no objection if posts are created on a contractual basis so that we have flexibility to employ people. After all such a huge project costing lakhs of crores of rupees cannot be stuck because some personnel will cost Rs 4 crore or 5 crore. It is only that the creation of posts is a time-consuming process but I hope everything will settle down in a month or two.’’Prabhu’s task force is scheduled to submit the report by the end of this year. The project is expected to displace 4.5 lakh people.
