Although today’s incarnation of India’s river-linking project is rooted in plans made in 1980, the idea dates to the 19th century, when the British irrigation engineer Arthur Thomas Cotton ...

KOCHI, India — Eloor smells like it is dying. Once it was an island of rich farmland on the Periyar River, 10.5 miles from the Arabian Sea, teeming with fish. Now, a stench of putrid flesh ...