S. Rajendran and

Nagesh Prabhu

BANGALORE: Seven years after the 2000 deadline for utilisation of the State's share of the waters of the Krishna under Scheme A of the Bachawat Award, Karnataka is yet to utilise its share fully thanks to the delay in the completion of several important irrigation projects in the Krishna basin.

Similar is the case with several of the Cauvery basin projects which have been inordinately delayed although the State has been utilising its share of waters allocated under the interim award of the Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal.

While Deputy Chief Minister and Finance Minister B.S. Yediyurappa has said he has provided one of highest allocations for the irrigation sector (Rs. 3,145 crore), Karnataka's interests are likely to receive a setback while seeking a justified and higher allocation under Scheme B of the Bachawat Award (the surplus waters in the Krishna) since many of the projects are pending completion. There are several projects wherein only the reservoirs have been completed and work on the network of canals and distributaries are pending resulting in a setback to stepping up the irrigation potential.

Shortfall

The cumulative effect is a major shortfall in the addition to irrigation potential under planned projects in the State during the Tenth Five Year Plan period, which drew to a close on Saturday. Against a target of 8.33 lakh hectares of land under major and medium irrigation, the net addition is only around 3.88 lakh hectares during the five-year period (2002-07).

The achievement of major and medium irrigation projects in the 10th Five Year Plan is only 45 per cent of the target and this would mean a 55 per cent carry forward into the Eleventh Plan period.

Interestingly, the draft document for the Eleventh Five Year Plan (under the planned projects) has set a target of creating irrigation potential of 3.19 lakh hectares of land under major and medium irrigation in the State.

The final award of the Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal apart, it is mentioned that the State has created an additional irrigation potential of 84,845 hectares of land in the Cauvery basin.

In other words, about 50 per cent of the target has been achieved since the target set for additional irrigation potential was 1,66,046 hectares during the plan period.

Both under planned and non-planned projects, irrigation potential was created in 4.72 lakh hectares against the target of 9.99 lakh hectares, an achievement of 47.27 per cent.

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