Let petro rivers flow in
A 69-km cross-border pipeline with a capacity to supply to Nepal 2 million metric tonnes of petroleum products per annum. What’s the big deal? Per ancient tales, King Bhagirath brought the river Ganga to Planet Earth from the heavens without much pomp and show. That was cakewalk. That was a gravity-flow water supply system, modern-day engineers are likely to argue. Well, the homo sapiens of this day and age are a bit different (About the ways of Bhagirath, we don’t know much). We go for easy things. We take things like time, effort and money into account. Consider the alignment of the pipeline. The pipeline originates at Motihari ( ≈ 66 metres), passes through Raxaul ( ≈ 78 metres), the Parsa national park in Nepal and culminates at an altitude of 303 metres in Amlekhgunj where Nepal has one of her vital fuel storage and distribution infrastructure. For a country of eight-thousanders, 300-metre elevation is no big deal. That’s beside the point here...