sandrp newsletter has a telling story of how careless, reckless and useless india has become when it comes to dam maintenance.

once called temples of modern india, these dams have become monsters of modern india. monsters that upper rich class of india crave for, monsters that cement companies, steel companies and construction companies lobby for, monsters that policy makers and politicians call as 'development'.

the jaswant sagar dam, one of many numerous old dams of india, has seldom been maintained. like fake development policies of india, the symbols of those policies are also superficial. the jaswant sagar dam burst caused widespread destruction and death which could have been prevented by basic parameters of maintenance.

the same article shows how america took care. the dam in this case is the taum sauk dam in missouri and several agencies of dam safety/regulation took several steps to make sure process is put in place as not to repeat the incident.

in india, we simply don't care. most of times, the people who want to talk about development of india tell 'india needs to grow like america'. what they forget in america is that environment, regulation, monitoring, error correction are much more stricter and adhered to when it comes to infrastructure projects. in india, all these parameters are the things that are to be thrashed in name of 'development'.