Bedti-Varada river inter-linking project

The Union Ministry of Jal Shakti (water resources), under the ‘National Perspective Plan’, had called for proposals to transfer water from water surplus basins to water deficit basins

• National Water Development Agency (NWDA) had identified 30 links in the country that included 16 peninsular rivers.
• There were two sensitive proposals among the six Karnataka proposals.
• These were the Bedti-Dharma-Varada and Aghanashini-Varada river links.

About Bedti-Varada river inter-linking project:

• The Bedti-Varada project was envisaged in 1992 to supply drinking water.
• The plan aims to link the Bedti, a river flowing west into the Arabian Sea, with the Varada, a tributary of the Tungabhadra River, which flows into the Krishna, which in turn flows into the Bay of Bengal.
• A massive dam will be erected at Hirevadatti in Gadag district.
• A second dam will be built on the Pattanahalla River at Menasagoda in Sirsi, Uttara Kannada district.
• Both dams will take water to the Varada via tunnels.
• The pre-feasibility report of the ‘Bedti-Varada link proposal’ was submitted by NWDA in August 2021.
• It envisaged the diversion of 242 million cubic metres (mcm) from the Bedti Basin to the water-scarce Tungabhadra sub-basin to irrigate 60,200 hectares (ha) in the Tungabhadra Project command Area of Raichur district.
• The draft detailed project report (DPR) of the Bedti-Dharma-Varada link and the drawings submitted by NWDA to the Government of Karnataka in February 2022, cover parts of the Bedti-Conservation Reserve and Shalmala Riparian Conservation Reserve.
• These are in the Western Ghats, which is eco-sensitive and a biodiversity hotspot.
  
  

Implications of the project:

If the project is implemented:

• The livelihood of the people in the downstream areas will be adversely impacted and the flora and fauna at the estuary will be affected.
• Forest loss shall impair the hydrological cycle, monsoon pattern and climatological conditions in the donor as well in the recipient basins.
• There will be threats to endangered species.
• When the free annual flow of water in the river system is prevented, there will be on-land transgression of marine water in the coastal zone. This will cause impairment of the interface between fresh and marine water, resulting in an acute shortage of drinking water.
• Changes in land use will aggravate natural hazards like landslides, lead to loss of forest wealth, disturb wildlife and human lead of life.
• The additional storage of 524 mcm of water, to be diverted from the proposed project into the heavily silted Tungabhadra reservoir, does not sounds technically possible.
• It will aggravate further, the problem of water logging and soil salinity in the area already under irrigation from the Tungabhadra Project.
• The surface and groundwater resources of the donor basin will be severely affected (both) for irrigation and even drinking needs during lean season.