NEW DELHI: The devastation caused by the Kosi has cast a shadow on India's ties with Nepal since the genesis of the calamity could well lie in Kathmandu's apathy towards timely maintenance of the barrage that was breached. The issue came up during the meeting that PM Manmohan Singh had with the Bihar chief minister on Wednesday where Nitish Kumar is learnt to have presented a 2004 aerial map to establish the "neglect", which may involve the Centre as well.

Nitish is understood to have requested the PM to advise his ministerial colleagues not to start a "blame game" over how the calamity came into being because history would point fingers towards extremely sensitive quarters. The Bihar government, officials said, was only the "executing agency” in a bilateral agreement between India and Nepal that brought the Kosi barrage into being in 1956.

The barrage's estimated lifespan of 30 years expired in 1986 but the river's morphology — it was showing a reverse tendency to shift eastward — began changing even earlier. This was an issue to be taken up at the diplomatic levels, Nitish said.

The biggest task ahead was to bridge the breach of August 18 and the Centre had to play a proactive role in it. According to the state government, the gap has widened to 1.7 km — reports from the disaster zone said it is already 3 km-wide — and bridging it would require a mammoth technical operation.

The Bihar CM, who sought an additional Rs 950 crore for this purpose as the executing agency, said he was ready to start the work at once, defying engineers advice to wait for the river to subside.

Of the total 1.44 lakh cusec flow of the Kosi through the barrage, the river, after the breach, was outpouring a massive 1.18 lakh cusec through its new route crossing through the Bihar plains. Its new meeting point with the Ganga in the south-east is yet to be known since the Kosi's course has become totally unpredictable. Satellite images show an ever widening expanse of gushing water through the affected districts.

The solution that lies in constructing a series of high dams in Nepal has never been given a serious bilateral push despite tall promises made by successive governments since Independence. The matter has to be dealt with extreme care to ensure that Indo-Nepal ties continue to be good.