Damming the Mahanadi river: The emergence of multi-purpose river valley development in India (1943-46)

Abstract

Nehruvian mnnumentalism has often been described as the most significant driver for large dam construction in independent India. Political and popular imagination has, until recently, not only largely hailed the pursuit of multi-purpose river valley development (MPRVD) as heralding the nation into the modern moment, but, more signifecantly, the latter has been celebrated as a part of an apolitical consensus for national development. This article argues that MPRVD schemes were introduced in India in a political context where Indian capital and the colonial state were constituting a new rhetoric and paradigm for rule.