The work of the Upper Bhadra Project to irrigate drought-prone parts of Chikkamagaluru, Chitradurga, Tumakuru and Davangere districts has been delayed in Chikkamagaluru district owing to the delay in getting clearance from the Forest Department.
The Tumakuru diversion canal that takes water from the distribution chamber at Ajjampura to Tumakuru, as per the design, passes through the grasslands of Basur Amruth Mahal Kaval Blackbuck Conservation Reserve and Bilvala Kaval in Chikkamagaluru district. The land measuring 1,820.11 acres was designated as a conservation reserve through a notification issued on April 30, 2011, as per the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972. The 2.15-km-long canal that intersects the conservation reserve is expected to obstruct the movement of blackbucks, foxes, wolves, and other wildlife, besides the Amruth Mahal cattle.
Earlier, environmentalists had filed a public interest litigation against the allotment of Basur Kaval and Bilval Kaval for the project. The petition was dismissed by the High Court in August 2022. However, the court directed the Water Resources Department to seek clearance from the Forest Department.
Compensatory afforestation
M.S. Harsha, Assistant Executive Engineer of VJNL (Kadur), told The Hindu that the project required 16.2 hectares of land for the total 3.16-km-long canal, of which 1.06 km passes through Bilval Kaval. “The total length of the Tumakuru canal is 159 km. The 3.16-kilometre stretch falls within the initial reach. Hence, we require early clearance to go ahead with the project,” he said. The Water Resources Department has approached the Chikkamagaluru district administration to identify suitable compensatory afforestation land so that they could seek forest clearance.
Besides that, the senior officers of the Water Resources Department recently held a meeting with officers of the Animal Husbandry Department on the construction of canals through the grasslands of Bilaval Kaval. The officers of the Animal Husbandry Department have appealed to the VJNL to construct the canals so that they would not affect the movement of the cattle. The animals should get passages, a pond, and chain-link fencing to ensure the safety of the cattle.
What project entails
The project, with an estimated cost of ₹20,852 crore, has been planned to lift 29.9 tmcft of water from the Tunga river and Bhadra reservoir to irrigate 2.25 lakh hectares and fill up 367 tanks. The first phase of the work involves lifting 17.4 tmcft of water from the Tunga river to Bhadra reservoir through a 11.26-km-long canal. In the second phase, 29.9 tmcft of water is lifted from Bhadra reservoir to the distribution chamber located at Ajjampura, from where water will be diverted to targeted destinations through the Chitradurga canal and the Tumakuru canal.
The implementing agency is facing difficulty installing power towers to make the pump houses operational in the first phase of the project due to the delay in getting forest clearance. C.R. Prasanna Kumar, AEE, VNJL (Muthinakoppa), said that 11 towers need to be installed in the area that is submerged due to the Upper Tunga Project. “The work can be done only during the summer when the water level is low in the Tunga river. The most suitable time to take up the work is from February to May. If we miss the opportunity now, we have to wait for another year for a suitable time,” he said.
Shivaprakash K.M., Chief Engineer of UBP, told The Hindu that the process to get the clearance was on. The work would be taken up as soon as the clearance was obtained.
