Dam Fever and The Diaspora

Arts & Ideas

BBC

Society & Culture

4.2 • 598 Ratings

🗓️ 28 June 2020

⏱️ 15 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

New Generation Thinker Majed Akhter explores how large dam projects continue to form reservoirs of hope for a sustainable future. Despite their known drawbacks, our love affair with dams has not abated – across the world more than 3,500 dams are in various stages of construction. In Pakistan this has become entwined with nationalism, both inside the community and in the diaspora - but what are the dangers of this “dam fever” ? This Essay traces the history of river development in the region, from the early twentieth century “canal colonies” in Punjab, to Cold War mega-projects, to the contemporary drive to build large new dams. Previously an engineer and a resource economist, Majed Akhter now lectures in geography at King’s College London. you can hear him discussing the politics of rivers in a Free Thinking episode called Rivers and geopolitics https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00051hb

New Generation Thinkers is a scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to select ten early career academics each year to turn their research into radio.

Producer: Alex Mansfield

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome back to the home of the oxymoron. Evil genius. He asked the newspaper to print his obituary early so he'd enjoy it. That's like hiding at your own funeral. Yeah, a big, great gig. I'm Russell Kane. Join me to weigh in on whether the biggest players in history are more evil or genius. Becoming that rich, I'd say that is some level of genius. It also helps it. It's a long time ago, right?
0:23.3	It's like the podcast version of telling your kids the ice cream van plays music when it's out of ice cream.
0:28.9	Listen to evil genius on BBC Sounds.
0:33.3	BBC Sounds, music, radio, podcasts.
0:37.1	Hello, I'm Shahed Abari, and welcome to this episode of the Arts and Ideas podcast,
0:42.2	in which we'll hear an essay from one of the 2019 New Generation thinkers.
0:47.3	They are early career academics who work with BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council
0:53.0	on a scheme that turns their research into radio.
0:56.0	I was one of the first ten people, chosen for the scheme, nearly ten years ago.
1:01.0	In this year's essays, you'll hear topics ranging from satire in Egypt, anti-Semitism,
1:07.0	the disappearing skills of Britain's textile industry, Renaissance art, racism in techno
1:13.1	music, and rethinking facial disfigurement. In dam fever and diaspora, Majidakda from King's
1:19.7	College London investigates the appeal of large dam projects. Lahore, the capital of Pakistan's
1:27.0	Punjab province, sprawls out below the airplane.
1:31.1	Many of the other passengers are British Pakistanis. Like me, they are part of the Pakistani
1:36.9	diaspora and probably feeling a discomforting mix of intimacy and existential estrangement from this landscape. We crane our necks for a
1:47.8	better view of this ancient garden city. Paches of dull green peek out against the background of dust,
1:55.3	concrete, and gray buildings, the parks and trees of Lahore. What can't be seen from high above are the concrete
2:03.8	structures that squeeze this lushness out of the desert, the thousands of miles of canals, dams,
2:10.7	dams, pumps, and barrages that push the waters of the Indus River into the landscape, economy,
2:17.3	and culture of Pakistan.
2:19.7	This irrigation system began to take modern form under British rule in the late 19th century.
	...

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