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Fighting the odds to save the Ganga


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emani rao
HYDRO POWER PROJECTS -Misconceptions
by emani rao on Jul 15, 2013 11:00 AM  | Hide replies

Some people aRE WRITING MANY ARTICLES ON RIVER GANGA and also on recent havoc in Uttarakhand.
1. Hydro Electric projects do not consume any waterat all. The water used for power generation flows back into the river or canals.
2. The water impounded in these reservoirs many a time averts floods in the downstream areas. In a way it can be said these dams prevent or control floods to some extent.

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Ajit Birdi
Re: HYDRO POWER PROJECTS -Misconceptions
by Ajit Birdi on Jul 19, 2013 03:42 PM
True.
I remember when Bhakra Dam was built and came into service in 1963.
And in same year the crops in Punjab failed, farmers of Punjab protested against building of the dam.
Their main argument was that the electricity was removed from water and the water became useless for irrigation.
It took long time to convince them that there was no electric in the water and nothing was removed from it.
It was just that the following year Punjab had a bumper crop.
Point is how can one educate those who do not wish to be educated.
This story is still rife in older generations in Punjab that the failure of crops were due to the building of the dam.
What can one do, NOTHING when people are not ready to accept.
Just leave them to their own, let them fire their own guns.



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palanki narayana
Re: Re: HYDRO POWER PROJECTS -Misconceptions
by palanki narayana on Jul 22, 2013 05:16 PM
The fears of farmers about removal of electricity from water are not confined to Bhakra dam alone. Every time a dam is constructed anywhere in India, the farmers raise this bogey.

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kamesh murthy
Maintenance
by kamesh murthy on Jul 15, 2013 09:57 AM

Maintenance of the entire Ganga river should be handed over over to the Indian army,all new govt.projects should get the approval of the army. Townships and hotel should not be allowed to mushroom near the holy temples.With this arrangement we can rest be assured that our ganga river can be cleansed of all the filth,pollution and restore it back as it was in 1950s


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pravin sarode
poor planning after independence is root cause of such tragedies?
by pravin sarode on Jul 14, 2013 06:05 AM

Heavy rainfall on the western side of the Western Ghats runs down numerous streams, which empty, into the Arabian Sea.
Construction of an interlinking canal system backed up by adequate storages could be planned to meet all requirements of Kerala as also for transfer of some waters towards east to meet the needs of drought affected areas. The peninsular Component is expected to provide additional irrigation of about 13 million hectare and is expected to generate about 4 million KW of power.

While rivers that flow through different countries had benefited such countries with mutual agreements on water sharing, some Indian states prefer waters to be emptied in oceans instead of benefiting fellow Indians. Most of time politicians use their votebanks politics to such extreme level that projects such as irrigation are only referred when there is no rain like 2012 or excess rain like now 2013 but not a single so called politician is aware of the challenges ahead in year 2014 if journalist investigate properly the GRLAND sheme to form water grid will be scam like BOFORs as every five year sheme Govt pays for flood control but secret swiss bank accounts are flooded with black money as schemes fail?

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PRAKASHBS
Do not agree
by PRAKASHBS on Jul 13, 2013 06:55 PM  | Hide replies

even though the facts expressed by gopalkrishna are partly true, whole argument is not acceptable. While building the barrages oe dam, to achieve enough water flow into dam site, many tributaries flowing on different paths are directedcto one stream towards the dam. While letting out the water on down stream. The water from the dam spillways or channels from gen stations would be directed only towards the main stream which continues to flow. This definitely causes drying up of smaller streams on down streams. The downstream of one dam would be upstream of the next dam. Hence, it is true that, due to building of dams and barrages, would definitely dry up many small tributary streams.

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pravin sarode
Re: Do not agree
by pravin sarode on Jul 14, 2013 06:08 AM
Looking at this project from a reductionist view, the concept of transferring water from surplus to deficit regions and creating a win-win situation sounds perfect. But if we look at it from a holistic point of view, every drop of water performs some ecological service at all times. The ecosystems have evolved over a period of thousands of years to make optimum use of the water available. Hence, any amount of water diverted from or to a region will cause damage proportional to the amount diverted. There is no thing as ‘surplus’ water from the holistic point of view.

Water from rivers flowing into the Aral Sea, which was seemingly going waste, was diverted on a large scale from these rivers for irrigation purposes. This led to a boom in the agricultural sector and prosperity in the region in the short term, but in the long run, the salinity of the sea increased manifold, making the water unfit for any kind of human use, also effecting the aquatic flora and fauna. This has led to the collapse of the economies in the area.

It is estimated that this project will upgrade the ecology due to minimum flow guarantee in rivers. The forest cover is expected to increase from 13% to 33%. At the same time, the dams that will need to be built will cause submergence of thousands of hectares of virgin forests.
for more details please visit http://www.jeywin.com/blog/interlinking-of-rivers-in-india-%E2%80%93-the-issues-and-concerns/


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GOPALAKRISHNA MURTHY
Do hydroelectric projects on Ganga dry it up?
by GOPALAKRISHNA MURTHY on Jul 12, 2013 06:13 AM  | Hide replies

This is a foolish assertion. Hydroelectric projects do not consume water but use the head of a location to generate power which is the dire need of the country today. At least after learning how the Tehri Dam saved the cities of Hrishikesh and Haridwar from the recent flash floods should make environmentalists understand the usefulness of the Dam. If a similar dam had been constructed on Alakananda, the damage could have been minimised. All hydroelectric projects in the Uttarakhand would be mostly barrages and would not impound much water like the Tehri Dam. They will divert water through tunnels to a generating station at a lower height from which water will again join the river downstream. May be a kilometer or so of the river may be depleted because of diversion of water through the tunnels. By design, these barrages do not destroy the ecosystem nor do they pollute the river. On the other hand the electricity generated is "Green" and cheap. What the environmentalists should look at is the pollution caused downstream of Hrishikesh by industries and cities letting all their sewage to the river.

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pravin sarode
Re: Do hydroelectric projects on Ganga dry it up?
by pravin sarode on Jul 14, 2013 05:57 AM
Garland Scheme to interconnect indian rivers was The Garland Canal Scheme" which was the "brain child" of late Sir Arthur Cotton during British Raj.Basically being an engineer by profession, he designed and constructed "Ayacut" across river Godavari at Dawaleswarm when he was the collector. Later, his "brain child" was given a shape and further improvised and prepared a scheme to connect all the major rivers/tanks/lakes in the country through canals for irrigation, water transportation,controlling floods,conserving water resource during famine,hydro power generation etc., on comprehensive lines, by another eminent engineer Dr.K.L.Rao, who happend to be inducted in Jawahalrlal Nehru's cabinet ( he was in fact, unanimously elected as MP from Vijayawada constituency). However, his entire report and plan of action was subjected to feed the termites by our great "law makers"in the parliament and he was made defunct in his mission ultimately. Successive Governments too followed suit. That is our credibility. Thanks to the Country's Apex Court for their speaking verdict. Let saner counsel prevail upon the Government to follow the verdict in letter and spirit. recently Shiv Sena MLA Prabhu Suresh also made couple or more Europe Tours to study GARLAND scheme there but he is dumped by his own party so also GARLAND Scheme to use flood water to make deserts like kuchchca sujalam sufalam ? massive corruption in the scheme may be another BOFORS

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palanki narayana
Re: Re: Do hydroelectric projects on Ganga dry it up?
by palanki narayana on Jul 22, 2013 05:02 PM
Sir Arthur Cotton is remembered with gratitude for the dam he built across Godavari at Dhavaleswaram. He did not envisage any scheme for interlinking of rivers. K.L.Rao suggested a Ganga-Kaveri link. Many engineers argued against the scheme, mainly because of the cost of pumping involved and the meagre amount of water that would flow to lower reaches. Garland Canal scheme was suggested by Dastoor Company.
To the best of my knowledge the only successful interlinking was between two rivers flowing through Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra.

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palanki narayana
Re: Re: Do hydroelectric projects on Ganga dry it up?
by palanki narayana on Jul 22, 2013 05:10 PM
Dr.K.L.Rao, who was inducted into the cabinet by Nehru was unceremoniously removed by Indira Gandhi. The press at that time said that the removal was because of Rao's "hare-brained" scheme. Rao contested from Vijayawada on a Janata Party ticket and lost by a massive margin. The river linking scheme got a quiet burial.

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