PRESENTATION ON

“INTERLINKING OF RIVERS IN INDIA”

PREPARED BY-Aditya KumarAstt. Engineer,PKS Infra Engineers Pvt. Ltd.

INTRODUCTION

India accounts for 2.4% of the world’s surface area but supports 16.7% of the world’s population. India possesses meager 4% of world’s water resources, that too highly uncertain in time and space due to its monsoonic climate. Still, India possesses dismal per capita storage capacity compared to those countries where rainfall is more or less evenly distributed in time and space. While per capita storage capacity in North America, Russia, Australia, China are respectively 6150, 6013,4729 and 2486 cubic meter, the same in India is only 262 cubic meter. Hence to build robustness to climate variability and to overcome water scarcity in India, India must very fast harness accelerated water storage capacity at all feasible sites.

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HISTORY

During the British raj, an Engineer Sir Arthur Cotton had sought to link the Ganga and the Cauvery to improve connectivity for navigation purposes.But due to the increased railway connectivity among the areas, the idea was shelved.In 1982, the National Water Development Agency (NWDA) was formed as an autonomous body entrusted with the task to carry out the water balance and feasibility studies of the river linking program.In Feb 2012, Supreme Court, gave its go-ahead to the interlinking of rivers and asked the government to ensure that the project is implemented expeditiously.

OBJECTIVES

Equitable distribution of the available water resources within a nation or a region;Increased Economic Efficiency;Self sufficiency in Basic water related outputs such as food and hydro-energy;Providing livelihood and employment opportunities in situ, in various parts of the nation so that migration of population, seasonal or permanent, short distance or long distance, in water distress situations, a distress large scale migration of population is avoided through a balanced regional economic development.

THE INDIAN ‘INTERLINKING OF RIVERS (ILR)’ PROJECT

The Project that the Supreme Court and the President have enjoined the government of India to implement may well be the largest infrastructure project ever undertaken in the world, to transfer water from the surplus river basins to ease the water shortages in western and southern India while mitigating the impacts of recurrent floods in the Eastern India. It will build 30 links and some 3000 storages to connect 37 Himalayan and Peninsular rivers to form a gigantic South Asian water grid. The canals, planned to be 50 to 100 meters wide and more than 6 meters deep, would facilitate navigation.

The interlinking of rivers in India is divided in following two distinct components: 1. Himalayan component 2. Peninsular component

FIGURE- HIMALAYAN AND PENINSULAR COMPONENT OF THE ILR PROJECT

ILR PRICE TAG

Financial cost:-Rs 5.6 L Crore

- 250% of India’s tax revenue in 2002- 1/4th of India’s annual GDP- Twice the entire irrigation budget of India since 1950

Rehabilitation cost:-- Estimated that 8,000 sq. km. of land affecting the thousands of villages and towns- 33 mn of people have been displaced in India during the last 50 years most have not been rehabilitated and ILR will also

displace million of people from the most needy section.

Environmental cost:- 50,000 ha of forest to be submerged only by peninsular link.- Intensive irrigation in unsuitable soils will lead to water logging and salinity.- Highly polluted rivers will spread toxicity to other rivers.- River system will be altered catastrophically creating droughts and desert.

BENEFITS

Cheap irrigation of 35 million hectare land;Availability of drinking water;More inland navigation;Generation of employment;Enabling full use of existing irrigation projects;Generating power to the tune of 35,000 MW with added benefits, including flood control;The transfer of 178 Km3 (34 Km3 through Himalayan and 144 km3 through Peninsular component) water per year through a combined network of 12,500 km long canals;

PROBLEMS

Unfortunately, the centre has made little use of the powers vested in it vide Entry 56 of List I.States have exclusive jurisdiction over waters that are located within their territories, including inter-state rivers and river valleys.It is arguably this status of water in the constitution that constrains the highest in the executive and the judiciary, despite their pronouncements on and commitment to resolving the problem.It has also stopped the Centre from establishing allocation rules and clearly defined water rights among states that have unending disputes over the sharing of inter-state water resources.The latest example is the second Krishna Water Disputes Tribunal, which has turned into a warzone, with a battery of lawyers, technical staff and irrigation department officials from Maharashtra, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh fighting to win the maximum allocation of the Krishna river for their respective state.

SOLUTIONS

We need to see if a change in its constitutional status is required.We also need to enhance our water-storage capacity, as we suffer the most from the vagaries of the monsoon.River-linking project, alongside a chain of water-conservation projects, would offer a solution.

ALTERNATIVES TO ILR

Rainwater harvesting and conservation of water resources.Recharging ground water reservoir.Large scale utilization of ground water in deltas.Community participation: Approaches of reducing water consumption by the affluent in the cities and reducing the wastage of water by the farmers in their field can be attempted.

REFERENCES

NWDA (2006)www.indianexpress.com/news/status-of-water/982120www.downtoearth.org.in/content/supreme-court-go-ahead-interlinking-

rivers

Thank You