Did Gujarat's city dwellers drank away 19% of Narmada water after November 2017? Farmers' leader asks CM

Modi watching Narmada water flowing to Saurashtra

By A Representative
With the Narmada dam’s water levels coming down to 112.32 metres as on February 2 – and a mere 181 Million Cubic Metres (MCM) of water available for use (click HERE) – top farmers’ leader Sagar Rabari has asked a pointed question: Where has all the water stored in the dam ahead of the Gujarat elections disappear?
The Narmada dam’s main canal outlet is at 110.64 metres, after which the dam’s unusable dead storage would be available. Ironically, as on October 1, 2017, the water level in the 138.68 metre dam (full reservoir level or FRL) was 130.59 metres.
Talking to Counterview, Rabari, who heads the state’s biggest non-political farmers’ body, Khedut Samaj – Gujarat (KSG), said, “We have been told that, because of the failure of rains in the catchment area, Gujarat’s share of Narmada water came down to 4.71 million acre feet (MAF), or 5,809.73 MCM, which is nearly half of the dam’s allocated share (9 MAF or 11,101.32 MCM) at FRL.”
“Taking into account that, despite shortage of inflow into the dam due to less rainfall, there was going to be no reduction in the allocation of drinking water (1.06 MAF or 1,307.49 MCM of 9 MAF), there is reason to wonder: Where did 1,126.49 MCM, or 19.39% of water disappear”, said Rabari.
“With just about 118 MCM, or 3.12% of water available in the Narmada dam today, Gujarat chief minister Vijay Rupani has now advised farmers not to take summer crop”, Rabari said, asking a pointed question: “Are we to believe that between November 2017 and January 2018, Gujarat’s cities drank up 19.39% of 4.71 MAF water in available in the dam?”
Suggesting that even a little child can link less rainfall with low water level in the dam, Rabari said, the Sardar Sarovar Narmada Nigam Ltd (SSNNL), responsible for Narmada water distribution in Gujarat, should have known by mid-September that there would be “less water released in the dam.”
“If the SSNNL did know that there would be a shortfall of drinking water and irrigation, why did it allow the criminal wastage of Narmada water for the Aji and Narmada dam inaugurations and other election-related programmes in September 2017?”, he asked in a statement.
As already reported, the inflow into the Narmada dam was suddenly allowed to jump – from 495 cumecs (cubic meters per second) on September 12, to 2384 cumecs on September 16, in anticipation of Prime Minister Narendra Modi visiting the dam for his birthday bash on September 17.
At the same time, ahead of Gujarat polls, Madhya Pradesh depleted its water storage so that the Narmada dam looked full on September 17. Thus, Madhya Pradesh’s dam, Indira Sagar Project’s storage level, which was already very low (about 33%) on September 11 with monsoon almost coming to close, was depleted by further 450 MCM from September 11 to September 16, while the Narmada dam water level rose by 750 MCM during the same period.
Asking Rupani and SSNNL officials to provide “the account of where and how much water was used”, and whether the water used is “as per the Water Usage Manual of the inter-state Narmada Control Authority”, Rabari insisted, they should also provide details of “how much water was wasted in the inaugurations”.
Also seeking information on “how many people could have been provided drinking water for how many months with 1,307.49 MCM of water”, Rabari said, they should also make public “how much area could have been irrigated in that amount of water.”
“Rajasthan has been allotted a mere 0.5 Million Acre Feet (MAF) of water by the Narmada Control Authority (NCA). It has already successfully provided irrigation in 2.46 lakh hectares (ha) and drinking water to 45 lakh people”, Rabari said, adding, “This proves that the Gujarat government and the SSNNL have grossly mismanaged and criminally wasted this precious resource of the people of Gujarat.”
“It is time that the city dwellers woke up and demanded an account of their stolen waters. The political class used the water as a vote-catching ploy”, he said, adding, the chief minister is now misleading the people of Gujarat "on the issue of drinking water and irrigation.”
“City-dwellers facing drinking water shortages in summer months should remember that farmers have not used that water”, said Rabari, adding, “Their water has been swindled from them, used for a totally useless and ulterior motive of getting votes in the assembly election and photo ops and then ultimately drained into the sea!”

Comments

Urgent need to study cause of large number of natural deaths in Gulf countries

By Venkatesh Nayak* According to data tabled in Parliament in April 2018, there are 87.76 lakh (8.77 million) Indians in six Gulf countries, namely Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). While replying to an Unstarred Question (#6091) raised in the Lok Sabha, the Union Minister of State for External Affairs said, during the first half of this financial year alone (between April-September 2018), blue-collared Indian workers in these countries had remitted USD 33.47 Billion back home. Not much is known about the human cost of such earnings which swell up the country’s forex reserves quietly. My recent RTI intervention and research of proceedings in Parliament has revealed that between 2012 and mid-2018 more than 24,570 Indian Workers died in these Gulf countries. This works out to an average of more than 10 deaths per day. For every US$ 1 Billion they remitted to India during the same period there were at least 117 deaths of Indian Workers in Gulf ...

A comrade in culture and controversy: Yao Wenyuan’s revolutionary legacy

By Harsh Thakor* This year marks two important anniversaries in Chinese revolutionary history—the 20th death anniversary of Yao Wenyuan, and the 50th anniversary of his seminal essay "On the Social Basis of the Lin Biao Anti-Party Clique". These milestones invite reflection on the man whose pen ignited the first sparks of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution and whose sharp ideological interventions left an indelible imprint on the political and cultural landscape of socialist China.

India's health workers have no legal right for their protection, regrets NGO network

Counterview Desk In a letter to Union labour and employment minister Santosh Gangwar, the civil rights group Occupational and Environmental Health Network of India (OEHNI), writing against the backdrop of strike by Bhabha hospital heath care workers, has insisted that they should be given “clear legal right for their protection”.

Uttarakhand tunnel disaster: 'Question mark' on rescue plan, appraisal, construction

By Bhim Singh Rawat* As many as 40 workers were trapped inside Barkot-Silkyara tunnel in Uttarkashi after a portion of the 4.5 km long, supposedly completed portion of the tunnel, collapsed early morning on Sunday, Nov 12, 2023. The incident has once again raised several questions over negligence in planning, appraisal and construction, absence of emergency rescue plan, violations of labour laws and environmental norms resulting in this avoidable accident.

History, culture and literature of Fatehpur, UP, from where Maulana Hasrat Mohani hailed

By Vidya Bhushan Rawat* Maulana Hasrat Mohani was a member of the Constituent Assembly and an extremely important leader of our freedom movement. Born in Unnao district of Uttar Pradesh, Hasrat Mohani's relationship with nearby district of Fatehpur is interesting and not explored much by biographers and historians. Dr Mohammad Ismail Azad Fatehpuri has written a book on Maulana Hasrat Mohani and Fatehpur. The book is in Urdu. He has just come out with another important book, 'Hindi kee Pratham Rachna: Chandayan' authored by Mulla Daud Dalmai.' During my recent visit to Fatehpur town, I had an opportunity to meet Dr Mohammad Ismail Azad Fatehpuri and recorded a conversation with him on issues of history, culture and literature of Fatehpur. Sharing this conversation here with you. Kindly click this link. --- *Human rights defender. Facebook https://www.facebook.com/vbrawat , X @freetohumanity, Skype @vbrawat

Job opportunities decreasing, wages remain low: Delhi construction workers' plight

By Bharat Dogra* It was about 32 years back that a hut colony in posh Prashant Vihar area of Delhi was demolished. It was after a great struggle that the people evicted from here could get alternative plots that were not too far away from their earlier colony. Nirmana, an organization of construction workers, played an important role in helping the evicted people to get this alternative land. At that time it was a big relief to get this alternative land, even though the plots given to them were very small ones of 10X8 feet size. The people worked hard to construct new houses, often constructing two floors so that the family could be accommodated in the small plots. However a recent visit revealed that people are rather disheartened now by a number of adverse factors. They have not been given the proper allotment papers yet. There is still no sewer system here. They have to use public toilets constructed some distance away which can sometimes be quite messy. There is still no...

Women's rights leaders told to negotiate with Muslimness, as India's donor agencies shun the word Muslim

By A Representative Former vice-president Hamid Ansari has sharply criticized donor agencies engaged in nongovernmental development work, saying that they seek to "help out" marginalizes communities with their funds, but shy away from naming Muslims as the target group, something, he insisted, needs to change. Speaking at a book release function in Delhi, he said, since large sections of Muslims are poor, they need political as also social outreach.

Warning bells for India: Tribal exploitation by powerful corporate interests may turn into international issue

By Ashok Shrimali* Warning bells are ringing for India. Even as news drops in from Odisha that Adivasi villages, one after another, are rejecting the top UK-based MNC Vedanta's plea for mining, a recent move by two senior scholars Felix Padel and Samarendra Das suggests the way tribals are being exploited in India by powerful international and national business interests may become an international issue. In fact, one has only to count days when things may be taken up at the United Nations level, with India being pushed to the corner. Padel, it may be recalled, is a major British authority on indigenous peoples across the world, with several scholarly books to his credit.

Gujarat Bitcoin scam worth Rs 5,000 crore "linked" with BJP leaders: Need for Supreme Court monitored probe

By Shaktisinh Gohil* BJP hit a jackpot in the form of demonetisation, which it used as an alibi to convert black money into white in Gujarat. Even as party scrambles for answers of how the Ahmedabad District Cooperative Bank (ADCB), whose director is BJP president Amit Shah, received old currency worth Rs 745.58 crore in just five days, and how Rs 3118.51 crore was deposited in 11 district cooperative banks linked with Gujarat BJP leaders, a new mega Bitcoin scam, worth more than Rs 5,000 crore has been unraveled.

Counterview

Search This Blog