Sweet Returns

A number of dams being built along the Saurashtra and Kutch coasts is not only saving the land from salinity but also creating huge water reservoirs and an opportunity for eco-tourism.
By Uday Mahurkar  

For decades, Gujarat has waged an unsuccessful battle against salinity in its coastal areas. But today it is turning the problem on its head with the novel scheme of building dams on rivers just before they merge into the sea, thus, preventing seawater from entering the coastal lands through river channels during high tide. This scheme will not only check the increasing salinity but also help in water conservation, besides promoting eco-tourism.

 

Gujarat, which has a 1,600 km coastline, the longest in the country, has always been vulnerable to salinity. But the problem was compounded when the farmers in the coastal region started exploiting groundwater in the mid-1980s. As a result salinity was increasing at the rate of 50 m annually on the Saurashtra and Kutch coasts. According to official estimates, by the late 1990s, 10.64 lakh hectares of cultivable land along the Gujarat coast had been swallowed by salinity.

 

Today, huge sweet water lakes have come up along the 1,100 km stretch of coastline in Saurashtra and Kutch where a number of dams have been constructed. In winters thousands of migratory birds, including some from Europe, flock these lakes. As many as 80 species of birds were sighted last winter at one such lake at Nikol near Bhavnagar. This presents an opportunity for eco-tourism based on both sea and sweet water. Says Amit Jethva of Gir Youth Nature Club, an NGO working for wildlife protection: "These lakes are helping create a mini-Kerala on the Gujarat coast. They are turning into bird sanctuaries." 
 
Apart from eco-tourism, the building of dams is also making water available for irrigation, changing the crop pattern in the process. Says Nanji Dhapa, 60, a farmer who owns eight hectares in Nikol village: "Till recently, we used to grow only groundnut and that too during the monsoon. Now we grow millet, corn and wheat even in summers." The Nikol dam now benefits six villages, where the land was earlier becoming saline.

 

So far, dams have been built on 30 rivers in the coastal region. There are a total of 71 rivers in Saurashtra and 97 in Kutch. Says M.S. Patel, secretary, Water Resources, Gujarat, who is overseeing the project: "We have taken up the project on a war footing. Next year we will build dams on 44 rivers in Kutch and over 15 rivers in Saurashtra." About Rs 100 crore have been spent on the scheme and another Rs 100 crore have been earmarked for the next year. In an innovative move, the state has roped in corporations like Ambuja Cement, Tata Chemicals and NGOs like Aga Khan Trust to build more dams.

 

The Government has also fortified the scheme by adding to it the concept of inter-linking-coastal sweet water lakes are being linked to each other through a network of canals wherever it is technically feasible. This is especially helpful in the monsoons when surplus water can be transferred from one lake to the other. In Junagadh district, where a network of canals has come up, some of the old coastal reservoirs have been revived.

 

Even Sodham village near Kodinar in Junagadh now has a beautiful lake. Sodham suffered from a perennial water scarcity due to weather conditions and its topography. Last year Ambuja Foundation, the company's NGO, linked it with another dam Panch Pipla through a canal. This year the surplus water from Panch Pipla flowed into Sodham. And for the first time the Sodham reservoir was filled up to the brim. Says H.S. Patel, joint president of the Ambuja Cement factory at Kodinar: "It is a dream scheme that will change the face of coastal Gujarat." 
 
All the rivers on which coastal dams are being built are non-perennial and generally go dry after the monsoon. Now, these will have lakes on their mouths, thus, providing ample sweet water to farmers. Just how sweet water goes waste in areas receiving erratic rainfall can be observed near Rajpar village in Junagadh district where the Raval river meets the sea and near Bhavnagar where the Malan river flows into the sea. Construction of a dam is underway on the Malan river, while one on the Raval river is scheduled to be built in a couple of years. The latest dam to come up under this scheme is on the Meda creek near Porbandar where it has created a sweet water lake from six small rivers which otherwise used to flow into the sea. The 500 m wide dam has created a lake 20 km in length and 5 km in width and that too in an area known for poor crop yield.

 

The scheme was first proposed in the late 1970s by former Gujarat chief secretary H.K.L. Kapoor to prevent salinity which had emerged as a big menace at that time on Gujarat's coast. Water conservation was not the main target at that time. For years, the scheme didn't make much headway till the Keshubhai Patel government dusted it off in the late '90s. It was only after Narendra Modi took over as chief minister in 2001 that the scheme became one of the spearheads of the state's water conservation and salinity prevention programme. "We shall turn Gujarat's coast into a mini-Kerala by building dams on rivers on the coast," Modi declared soon after assuming office. However, the project could not have been successful without the support of farmers who donated their land. Says Rambhai Jhala, a farmer of Kodinar who donated 4.5 acres to the canal: "My farmland was not saline. But a majority of farmers in our area are facing the salinity problem. So I thought I should make the sacrifice."

 

As the project is being implemented with full vigour in the western state maybe other states like Orissa, which has a huge coastal belt but receives scanty rainfall, can learn a lesson from it.

 

http://www.indiatoday.com/itoday/20051017/gujrat.shtml