India’s biggest hydropower project, proposed across three districts of Arunachal Pradesh’s Siang valley, is being pitched as a strategic counter to China’s mega dam upstream. But the plan has triggered resistance from indigenous tribes who fear the reservoir could submerge villages and sever their deep-rooted ties with the river.
The Siang, known as the Yarlung Tsangpo in Tibet, enters Arunachal Pradesh near Gelling and flows 294km before joining the Dibang and Lohit at Sadiya in Assam to form the Brahmaputra. Prabin Kalita examines the battle over the project.
