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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Floods man-made, says report by Sushil Manav

Floods man-made, says report by Sushil Manav

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published Published on Aug 23, 2010   modified Modified on Aug 23, 2010


Government apathy and “land grabbing” on the Ghaggar basin by builders with the alleged collusion of bureaucrats, politicians and engineers are responsible for the recent floods in Punjab and Haryana.

A report of the South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers and People (SANDRP) - “An analysis of flood disaster in the Ghaggar basin in July 2010” - suggests that the floods could be a wake up call for the affected states and the authorities concerned, but is does not appear so.

The report by Swarup Bhattacharya and Vineet Kumar of the SANDRP says that while the ill-maintained SYL was instrumental in bringing floods to new areas, another yet-to-be-commissioned Hansi Butana Canal also caused flood disasters in areas otherwise not prone to floods.

The report maintains that at many places various builders, allegedly in partnership with bureaucrats, politicians and engineers, have encroached upon “flood plains and even flow paths”. Local water harvesting structures, too, have been poorly maintained.

The indifference of successive governments towards this issue can be gauged from the fact that a committee was constituted 20 years ago to mitigate the problems of floods in the Ghaggar basin.

Named the Ghaggar Standing Committee, the working group is chaired by a member of the Central Water Commission and includes officials of Punjab, Haryana and Rajasthan.

Quoting an official of the Irrigation Department, the report says that 20 meetings of the committee have been held in these 20 years, without reaching any results.

“No matter how much the unprecedented rain in the catchment areas of the Ghaggar basin, human interference in its flow has caused the devastation. In the name of canalisation or embankment, policy-makers virtually want to turn a river into a canal,” the report maintains.

The SANDRP report also holds lack of coordination between the riparian states and even within a state on the upstream and downstream of the Ghaggar responsible for the destruction caused by floods.


The Tribune, 22 August, 2010, http://www.tribuneindia.com/2010/20100823/haryana.htm#1


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