After years of foot-dragging, India will begin work in around a month on an $87 billion project to connect some of the country's biggest rivers, government sources say, as Prime Minister Narendra Modi bets on the ambitious project to end deadly floods and droughts.
The mammoth plan entails linking nearly 60 rivers, including the mighty Ganges, which the government hopes will cut farmers' dependence on fickle monsoon rains by bringing millions of hectares of cultivatable land under irrigation.
In recent weeks, some parts of India and neighboring Bangladesh and Nepal have been hit by the worst monsoon floods in years, following two years of poor rainfall.