3 Review(s)

The performance of canal irrigation system in India has recently become a subject of considerable criticism. Irrigation water utilisation is a complex technological activity. It is generally held that in the absence of well-articulated rules to ensure efficiency in canal water distribution, mal distribution tends to take place with all its attendant socio economic and environmental consequences. A modest attempt has been made in this book to give an account of the status of water distribution and examine some of the issues associated with water management in irrigation projects. This study clearly brings out the fact that only technical and administrative measures cannot provide the remedy. An understanding of the socio-economic aspects of irrigation is necessary. This book also addresses itself to the problems of people's participation in irrigation management. Issues like arguments in favour of people's participation, what it is, why people are reluctant, why people should co-operate, how it affects the entire operational system have been discussed. About the Author Sib Ranjan Misra, a Ph. D. in Economics (Jadavpur University) and D.E.P. (Istituto di Studi per lo Sviluppo Economico, University of Naples), was on the teaching staff of the University of North Bengal (1971-78). He is currently engaged as a Professor of Economics in the Department of Economics in the Department of Economics in the Department of Economics and Politics, Visva-Bharati University, Santiniketan. His present assignment includes research and teaching in various branches of Economics. He has completed quite a number of projects on problems of tea plantation, fisheries development, irrigation management etc. Sponsored by ICSSR, UGC, ICAR etc. He has also served for quite some time as an Advisor on the Fisheries Development Advisory Board, Ministry of Agriculture and Co-operation, Government of India. The author's publications have appeared in various professional journals and also include books entitled Tea Industry in India (1986), Fisheries in India (1989), Floriculture in West Bengal- Problems and Potentials (co-authored, 1997).