THE PIONEER
AN ‘UNDERSTANDING’ THAT CAN PROVE FATAL
Friday, 23 October 2015
New
Delhi has reasons to be worried by the fast pace with which China is building
dams along rivers that impact India
Faced with an acute shortage of water and energy
resources to meet the needs of a burgeoning population, China has turned to
exploit the Tibetan rivers and is now in a damming spree in the Brahmaputra
river (Yarlung Tsangpo) to fulfil its increasing needs. Hence after
constructing the two inter-linking canals, the eastern and the central routes,
to transfer water from the water endowed south to the arid northern areas in
2014, it has operationalised recently the Zangmu project, the largest
hydropower facility located in the middle reaches of the river, raising
concerns for India.
This project is to be followed by five more dams
upstream for power generation. The Shuomatan project, the Great Bend project
near Indian border, is also being planned by the Chinese to divert the
Brahmaputra waters to its north areas through the third link canal, the western
route.
Though our neighbour has been insisting time and
again that their projects being run-of-the river schemes would not affect
downstream flows, the deep reservoirs built with sufficiently large storage
capacities at such projects and the highly snow melt yield at the sites could
be diverted by the Chinese through tunnel intakes to create artificial
water scarcity downstream. Further, simultaneous opening of the project gates
could result in man-made floods downstream. However, China has assured that it
would be providing more river flow data as per the ‘Understanding’ signed in
2013 and that India need not be unduly perturbed over Chinese projects in
Yarlung Tsangpo.
A perusal of the existing ‘Understanding’ would
reveal that it deals only with regard to exchange of flow data between the
countries, and hence, it is not a guarantee to allay our fears of floods
and water scarcity in Brahmaputra, arising particularly during conflicts.
For taking care of such situations, we have to
have a high dam with a storage capacity adequate to absorb the floods from
upstream and also to contain high water level fluctuations in the river due to
indiscriminate operation of upstream Chinese reservoirs, as presently there are
no such structures downstream in the river. Therefore, such a project is
strategically important for India.
Looking at the experience of the Mekong river
basin countries with China, we should not remain complacent with the
‘Understanding’ and the assurances offered by
our neighbour. We need to put the country’s
strategies in place well in time, so that our national interests are insured
against future developments. This is all the more necessary since
projects like the High Dam take years to be implemented to address the concerns
arising out of the Chinese projects.
However, our relevant ministry is yet to start
work. Leave alone construction, even preliminary works for taking up this
strategically important project are still to be initiated by the authorities.
In fact, succumbing to the diktats of environmental activists and groups,
authorities have put a complete ban on the design and approval of new water
resource development projects, till the committee set up by the Government some
time back submits its report on environmental flows (e-flows) required for all
the rivers in the country. Hence, all such projects, including the Brahmaputra
High Dam, the river-linking project, the India-Nepal Pancheshwar project etc,
irrespective of whether they are strategically important or not, will have to
wait till the committee’s report on e-flow is finalised!
Unfortunately, even after conceiving this
project more than a decade ago in the aftermath of floods resulting from the
failure of a Chinese dam in 2000, our authorities continue to be lackadaisical
in their approach regarding the construction of the project. This is sure to
cost heavily to the country since, for want of a storage dam we would have to
depend on China for the release of waters during the dry season and for
protection from floods during the wet season.
Added to this situation is the likely security
threats arising from the Tibetan liquid bombs during periods of conflicts with
our neighbour. We cannot ignore history.
(The
writer is a former Member Secretary, Indian National Committee on Irrigation
and Drainage, Central Water Commission)
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