Issues
More `development'
NITYA JACOB
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Does the Ken-Betwa Link Project, that aims to link rivers, signal the beginning of the privatisation of water resources?
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Photo: Nitya Jacob
Little Gain: Linking may lead to more frequent flooding of the Betwa river.
EVERYTHING about this controversial project is low-key. The Ken-Betwa Link Project is the first link in a series of projects to build dams and canals between 30 of India's rivers, major and minor. The Inter-Linking of Rivers project, as it is called, is divided into the Himalayan and Peninsular components, with 14 and 16 links respectively. The reason, ostensibly, is to provide a "permanent solution" to India's recurrent droughts and floods, irrigate about 40 million hectares of additional land and have a hydropower potential of 34,000 MW. All this would come at a whopping cost of Rs. 5,60,000 crores and be built over the next 10 years or so.
Defunct network
In August 2005, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh signed a Memorandum of Understanding for starting work on the canal to link the Ken and Betwa rivers. The 427-km long Ken river rises in Madhya Pradesh, flows through the State for 292 km and then joins the Yamuna at Chilla in Uttar Pradesh. The districts of Chatarpur and Panna in Madhya Pradesh and Bandha in Uttar Pradesh depend on it for water via a network of weirs and canals built a century ago. According to the MP irrigation department, these have all been declared defunct, having outlived their utility.
The Betwa is another tributary of the Yamuna that also rises in the same region as the Ken and flows north through MP for 232 km. It joins the Yamuna at Hamirpur in UP, upstream of the Ken. This is the larger of the two rivers.
The link proposal suggests building a 230-km-long canal to transfer 1020 million cubic metres (mcm) of surplus water from the Ken to the Betwa river. The canal will originate at the Daudhan dam, to be constructed a few kilometres upstream of two existing (defunct) weirs. In addition, there will be four more dams. All of these will be built in the Panna National Park and will submerge a large part of this protected area. The project will irrigate an estimated 3.7 lakh hectares of additional land, give 3.3 lakh people drinking water and generate 66 MW of power. It is estimated to cost Rs. 8,500 crore. For this monumental benefit, 8,500 people will be displaced and 8.650 Ha of land submerged by the dams and the canal. The canal will be linked to existing tanks and ponds en route to its destination to the Barwa Sagar, an old reservoir on a small stream near Jhansi that empties into the Betwa river.
Wrong assumptions
Noted environmentalist Dr. G.D. Agarwal says the project's assumptions are wrong. The actual availability of surplus water in the Ken is 342 mcm, as estimated by irrigation engineers in UP. The project's estimate assumes that all farmers in the Ken's command area grow just a single crop. Many do, but most are switching to double cropping. They grow one crop during the rains and depend on canal irrigation for their second crop. They complain that water supply from the irrigation department is erratic and not given when they need it. If the little water that Ken has is diverted, most farmers here will be left with just one crop, dependent entirely on an increasingly erratic monsoon.
The towns of Banda and Attara in the river's command area also depend on canal water from the Gangau weir for their requirements. Groundwater is brackish and cannot be used for drinking. At a pinch it can be used for agriculture. Which is why, explains Dr. Bhartendu Prakash of the Vigyan Shiksha Kendra at Atarra, farmers have relied on the rains traditionally, and the canals over the past century, to grow crops. The soil is not porous, so field bunds allow them to capture enough rainwater during the monsoons to grow rice first and gram and other dryland crops later in the year. Land holdings here are small and most farming in this region is subsistence farming. They grow mustard, pulses, coarse cereals and rice, if the monsoons are good. This cropping pattern is replicated across most of Bundelkhand, through which the link canal will pass.
In addition to rains, Bundelkhand has a rich history of tank irrigation. The Chandelas and later rulers built a network of large and small tanks by walling up streams, drains and rivers over the last millennium. These are largely functional even now and in many towns and villages are the main source of water for drinking, washing and irrigation. Some are large enough to be used for fishing. Most hold enough water to last a couple of years without good rainfall. Most places along the likely route of the canal are already well irrigated by these tanks and other small rivers in the region, including the Dhasan river.
Against the natural flow
The canal is supposed to feed some of these tanks, while draining others. The entire stretch that the canal is to pass through is hilly and very rocky. The land slopes from south to north and from east to west. All the rivers and underground aquifers flow in this general direction. The canal will block this natural flow of water, leading to waterlogging in the southern part of the region. It will reduce water availability to the north. The canal also has to cross the Dhasan river. All this will make its construction a contentious and environmentally destructive activity.
In order to recover the construction costs, the project proposes to charge for the use of water, based on the crop grown per Ha. The charges for the five years will be Rs. 20/ Ha, Rs. 30/ Ha for the next 14 years and Rs. 40/ Ha for 20 years after that. Irrigation cess will be levied at Rs. 10/ Ha. In order to pay these charges, farmers will have to change their cropping pattern to cash crops. Small and marginal farmers will get edged out in the process.
Rajendra Parmar, who farms some 10 Ha outside Nowgong near Chatarpur, is sceptical about the canal. The land, he says, is very well irrigated with tanks, canals and tube wells. The extra water will only cause waterlogging.
Further, both the rivers flow through the same part of the country. They flood at the same time. The Betwa enters the Yamuna upstream of the Ken. If the Ken's waters are added to the Betwa, there will be regular floods along the section of the Yamuna between Hamirpur and Chilla. Conversely, says Dr. Prakash, there will be droughts immediately downstream of Chilla. The project will not mitigate floods or droughts; it will exacerbate them.
Not a private resource
Other experts see this as the first step towards privatising water resources. The government will not have money to implement this hugely ambitious project. It will choose the build-own-operate-transfer route and lease rivers to concessionaires. These operators will own the water resources for several years and will charge users, both urban and rural, for that duration. This goes against the country's tradition of treating water as a community, not private, resource.
In the West, whose example we are following in the "development" of water resources, large dams are being decommissioned. The government's argument that such "development" of water resources is necessary to remove poverty, is specious — it is the poorest who get displaced in the process. There are enough examples of drought mitigation at the local level around the country. However, the drawback from the government and industry's perspective is that these are driven by local communities and do not benefit either babudom or industrialists. A mega project is a feast for bureaucrats, politicians and businessmen. This alone will be sufficient reason to go ahead with river linking despite objections and agitations by local people.
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