2019 – Posted in: Daily News

POLAVARAM MULTI-PURPOSE PROJECT

For: Preliminary & Mains

Topics covered: About the Project, Significance, Objections

The Polavaram Multi-purpose Project will be completed by June 2021. It is Officially known as the Indira Sagar Multipurpose Project.

The Centre declared it a national project in 2014.
The dam across the Godavari River is located in West Godavari District and East Godavari District in Andhra Pradesh and its reservoir spreads in parts of Chhattisgarh and Orissa.

The multi-purpose Polavaram project dam would be 150 feet high and will store 194 TMCs of water.
This project will help irrigate over 7.2 lakh acres besides providing drinking water to several cities and towns, and to industries.
The project is expected to generate 960 MW of power, and fulfill the water needs of industries and 540 villages in Andhra Pradesh.

The environmental impact assessment (EIA) of the project says 276 villages will be affected.
Around 98,000 families are affected, the government spends an extra 33,000 crores to rehabilitate them.
Odisha, Telangana, and Chhattisgarh have also opposed the project, fearing that it may submerge populated areas in these states.
Recently, the Telangana government appealed to the Supreme court to review the environmental impact assessment of the project as the clearance was obtained in 2005.
Earlier, Odisha Chief Minister had written to Prime Minister to stop the project until pending issues are resolved.
The International Water Management Institute based in Sri Lanka that studied the Krishna-Godavari river link found that 95 percent of the areas to be irrigated by the Polavaram dam through the right canal were already irrigated.
The flood situation estimate by the Central Water Commission has not been incorporated in the design.

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