Indira Sagar Multipurpose Project: Objectives and Drawbacks

Indira Sagar Multipurpose Project: Objectives and Drawbacks

Question: Indira Sagar Multipurpose Project also known as Polavaram project has recently been approved and initiated. Discuss the objectives of this project and drawbacks associated with it.

Objectives

• The Polavaram project will harness river Godavari through the construction of a 45.72 metre, 2.32 km long dam

• Dam will have storage capacity of 551 million cubic metre and power generation capacity of around 960 MW

• Water from the reservoir of the dam will irrigate 291,778 ha of land in districts of east and west Godavari, Krishna and Vizag through 2 major canals The project aims to link Polavaram and Vijaywada through interlinking of Godavari and Krishna rivers right before they merge into the sea

• The project also aims to store water at Polavaram dam located in to the west of the Godavari

• It focuses on irrigating more than 3 lakh ha agricultural land and generate 950+ MW hydroelectricity

• It will also supply water to Vizag and Vishakhpatnam steel plants

B. Drawbacks

• The height of the dam should be lower otherwise the Malkangiri forest area of Odisha is submerged in water as Godavari is fed from two rivers in Odisha namely Sabari and Sileru

• Dam will also submerge villages across the Sabari river

• It will also submerge the villages of Khammam district and not provide any water to this region

• EIA says more than 250 villages and 1.5 lakh villagers will be negatively affected as a result of this project

• CWC has changed the flood situation estimate and this fresh assessment has not been adhered to by the Polavaram project
• National Institute of Hydrology also found that in case the dam bursts, the peak flood will be around 198,2000 cumecs

• The supporters of this project say that 291,000 ha of new land will be brought under irrigation with 129,000 through the right canal and 162,000 through the left

• Official data from the government shows that 71% of the region to be irrigated under the right canal is already irrigated since 1999

• Sri Lanka’s International Water Management Institute in Sri Lanka has found that 95% of the region to be irrigated by the Polavaram dam through the right canal is already under irrigation and remaining 5% of the area is not under cultivation

• Two lift irrigation projects namely Tadipudi and Pushkharam have already been irrigating around 161,874 haha of total area to be irrigated by this project

• Also the already irrigate 51,800 ha. This means the Polavaram dam may irrigate only 80,937 ha of new land.

• Irrigation may be hampered through this project. An analysis of 13 existing projects has shown they could partly irrigate 1.3 million ha against expected 1.68 million ha

Facts and Stats

• The Polavaram project was first conceived in 1941

• In 2004, Andhra CM YSR Reddy revived the demand for this project

• 2009 was the year the Andhra Government requested the Centre to commence with this project

• Centre declared it to be a national project, but this was legally opposed by Odisha and Chhattisgarh

• In 2014, an ordinance was promulgated whereby 250 villages from Khammam were transferred to AP so that Telangana does not get adversely affected by the project

• Currently, the project is on and so far, 1730 persons in six villages displaced by this project have been rehabilitated

• Project will generate 23.44 thousand million cubic feet of water for domestic and industrial use.