Polavaram

Godavari: The New Narmada?
Will Polavaram be another ecocide zone? Not if we apply the Vedanta logic to it.

Godavari Flow Chart

* 80 TMC of water diverted to river Krishna. Water supply to Visakhapatnam. Drinking water to 540 villages.
* Will irrigate 2.91 lakh hectares. Power generation: 960 MW
* Full reservoir Level: 151 feet, total cost: about Rs 17,800 crore
* Clearance from MoEF in July 2010
* Environmentalists and rights activists say the dam could inundate parts of AP, Orissa and Chhattisgarh, swamp 280 villages. It will displace two lakh people, mostly tribals.

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The Polavaram dam across the river Godavari has been a dream project for several governments in Andhra Pradesh. Most of them had to let it stay at that—a dream. An ambitious project which envisages harnessing the river’s surplus water that otherwise flows into the sea (80 thousand million cubic feet is also diverted annually to the Krishna river), the Polavaram dam has been in the conceptual stage since 1943. It was only when Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy took charge and accorded irrigation topmost priority that the dam’s construction was taken up as part of the Jalayagnam programme.

Christened the Indira Sagar Polavaram project, the 151-ft-high dam will have a gross storage capacity of 194.6 TMC and a power generation capacity of 960 MW. However, the dam has remained controversial from the word go. One of the major issues is the massive submergence of forest and cultivated land it will entail in Khammam, the west and east Godavari districts, Chhattisgarh and Orissa. Up to 40,138 hectares will be affected, uprooting a population of two lakh, many of them primitive tribal groups and adivasis. In all, 280 villages would be hit. Besides, reserve forests and a part of the Papikonda wildlife sanctuary would cease to exist. However, regardless of all this, the Union ministry of environment and forests (MOEF) cleared the proposal for diversion of 3,731.07 hectares of forest land for the Indira Sagar project in July 2010. While the AP government celebrates it as an achievement, tribal activists and environmentalists see red.

Madhusudhan N., who runs ngo Yakshi and works for tribal rights, says the logic which the Saxena committee report used to nullify Vedanta’s project in Orissa should apply here as well. “The MOEF’s clearance is based on the assurance by the AP government that there are no forest rights to be settled under the Scheduled Tribes and Other Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Right) Act, 2006, in the project area. The fact is that several tribals like Koyas and Konda Reddies have been living here for long. Their cultural ecosystems, their territorial rights to forest resources need to be recognised. In other words, they cannot be evicted. The AP government has obviously misled the Centre on these facts.”

S. Jeevan Kumar, president, Human Rights Forum, calls the dam a hugely destructive project. “Tribals and Dalits,” he says, “will account for 65 per cent of the displaced. The natural resources, cultural systems, traditional knowledge of these people are closely tied to the land they inhabit. With no forest, the existence of these communities will become untenable. Another condition for the MOEF’s clearance is that the consent of gram sabhas (village councils) has to be obtained. Not a single gram sabha has given its consent so far. The Centre cannot apply the Forest Rights Act, 2006, selectively only in Orissa and ignore it in AP.” Both the Orissa and Chhattisgarh governments have gone to the Supreme Court seeking a stay on the dam.


Hind Site Work on the main canal

Irrigation and environment expert Prof T. Shivaji Rao says the dam is being built by blindly ignoring aspects like climate change and global warming. “Over the years, the intensity and duration of storms in the Godavari are going to increase by 20-30 per cent. The AP government cannot alter nature.” He points out that the National Institute of Hydrology, Roorkee, had in 1999 said the maximum flood inflow in the Godavari could be 60 lakh cusecs. The Central Water Commission (CWC) was only slightly more conservative: it put the figure at 50 lakh cusecs in September 2006. “Even if one were to take CWC’s figure, the Polavaram dam would be a ticking time-bomb during floods,” says Shivaji Rao.

Union Nations consultant for Asian irrigation projects, T. Hanumantha Rao, while factoring in these climate change facts, had suggested an alternative to the Polavaram dam in the form of three barrages at Polavaram, between Bhadrachalam and Konavaram and across the Sabari river close to the Orissa border. The AP government ruled out his proposals. “They were technically unviable,” says irrigation minister Ponnala Laxmaiah. Hanumantha Rao says that he has never been against the Polavaram project but these barrages might just present a solution and work out cheaper than the current cost of Rs 17,728.20 crore and will generate more power (1,038 MW).

Both Shivaji Rao and Hanumantha Rao point out that earthen dams are prone to breaches. Since the soil foundation at Polavaram is of clay and sand, a concrete dam is unviable. Other major rivers in the world which have lesser peak flood discharges than Godavari, such as the Yangtze in China, the Mississippi in the US or the Volga in Russia, do not have earthen dams at locations where such high flood flow conditions occur. The Indira Sagar project is located almost at the end of the river where the peak discharge occurs.

Shivaji Rao points out: “In October 2009, the Krishna river saw unprecedented floods, more than 2.7 times the normal flow, and Kurnool was submerged for days together. And there is no dam out there. If such a situation occurs in the Godavari and the Polavaram dam is built, then a breach is almost certain. The maximum flood inflow would be 90 lakh cusecs. Imagine a tsunami of 200 TMC of dam water breaking across the Godavari delta. Overnight, 45 lakh people would have a watery grave.”

Irrigation officials in the government dismiss these theories as alarmist and say that the benefits of the Polavaram dam are too many to be ignored. Irrigation minister Laxmaiah says that the objections by Orissa and Chhattisgarh have no relevance since they are signatories to the 1976 Bachawat Award on the Krishna waters. “We have obtained all the clearances and are offering a compensation package of more than Rs 600 crore for the two states. We are offering the best rehabilitation and relief packages in the country,” says Laxmaiah. “In fact, we invited Medha Patkar about four years back to assess the R&R package and she found it to be good. The government has also taken the suggestions of the World Water Forum.” Do the people have a say, that is the moot question.