Guest Posts

Guest post: Ramaswamy R Iyer

This is in response to the comments made by Rahul Banerjee (“National Water Policy”, 13 August 2011) and Chetan Pandit (“Alternative National Water Policy: A Critique”, 10 September 2011) on my article “National Water Policy: An Alternative Draft for Consideration” (25 June 2011).

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Source: SANDRP

National water policies are extremely important legal and institutional tools as they reflect the basic intent and direction that the government is planning to take regarding water resources. To ensure that this is a direction acceptable and beneficial to all, open public consultations need to be the backbones of such policies. Thus looking at the immense importance of water to society & environment, it is extremely important to have consultations on the recently published Draft 2012 National Water Policy [1], especially at the grassroots levels, right up to the gram sabhas, so that the ground concerns get reflected in the policy.

Having limited participation of communities in the process threatens to make the exercise almost entirely undemocratic and is likely to be hijacked by vested interests. Though it has been stated that consultations about the Policy have been held [2], these are far from adequate and have not be publicised enough to ensure wide participation. Most of these were not open consultations, but consisted of invited delegates. This cannot be called as an open, inclusive process. Four regional consultations were organised with Panchayati Raj representatives and it is too ambitious to assume that four such meetings, held in cities can reflect rural concerns entirely. As it is, many of the important points raised in the Panchayati Raj Institution consultations do not find a mention in the Draft Policy.

The exercise of reformulating the NWP was taken up also in the context of climate change, as mentioned in the National Action Plan for Climate Change and also the National Water Mission, and that makes it all the more important, that sections of the society vulnerable to climate change (tribals, rain-fed farmers, small and marginal farmers, coastal communities, hill communities, fisher-folk, women, communities based in the North-East and the Western Ghats and in rural areas in general) are consulted in the process. This does not seem to be the case with the process followed to produce the current Draft Policy.

The draft National Policy 2012 differs greatly from its 1987 and 2002 predecessors in the direction it seems to be taking as well as some of its basic premises. Hence, the significance of a transparent consultation process before proceeding forward becomes even more crucial.

Some of the major areas of concern from the Draft National Policy include:

• Unlike the previous policies, this policy does not spell out the clear priorities of water allocation. It accords first stated priority to basic livelihood needs and ecosystem needs. This can be considered as a welcome step only if all the specific details about water allocation for livelihoods and ecosystem needs are worked out, discussed and accepted along with the necessary legal and institutional back up. In the absence of any of these, just a statement that “After meeting the minimum quantity of water required for survival of human beings and ecosystem, water will be treated as an economic good” may end up making water ONLY an economic good. The National Policy of 2002 had also stated that minimum flows will be maintained in rivers, but in the absence of any further direction, nothing happened on this front for the last 10 years anywhere in the country, and the state of Indian rivers has only worsened in this  period. When the South African Water Act was passed in 1997, based on the White Paper on South African Water and Sanitation Policy, 1994, the policy took a detailed look at defining water for basic human needs, its quality, quantity, access, distance, etc, as well as various issues related to water and environment. It was only with this background that South Africa could take the revolutionary step of securing water for basic human needs and ecological reserves first. It went through a rigorous, extensive process of consultations with the communities and other stakeholders (which still continues) to actually calculate the reserve, and to implement and monitor it.
• When India’s Draft NWP 2012 mentions that ‘Access to safe and clean drinking water and sanitation should be regarded as a right to life essential to the full enjoyment of life and all other human rights’, this statement needs to be strongly qualified in the context of exhausting all local options, demand side management measures and ensuring maximum reuse and recycle. In the absence of this, large dams and infrastructure projects will continue to be planned and justified for wasteful needs of large cities like Mumbai and Delhi, as is happening now, without considering the carrying capacity and sustainability of ecosystems involved.
• The sub-section on 'Adaptation to climate change' and the statement that special attention will be given towards mitigation at micro-level by enhancing the capabilities of community to adopt climate resilient technological options is welcome. However, the crucial lesson which is being learnt the world over, of how to make the huge existing water infrastructure (which is currently causing more problems in face of unpredictable climate change) more responsive and adaptable to climate change is not addressed here. Also the need for sustainable agricultural practices like increasing soil’s capacity to retain moisture by increasing soil carbon content, System of Rice Intensification (SRI), organic farming, etc as coping measures for climate change also do not find a mention. The world over, ecological coping strategies like flood forecasting, flood preparedness, flood regulation zones, riparian belts, mangrove protection, biological bank stabilization methods etc., are used as coping and adaptation measures. These biological, low impact and low investment measures do not find a mention on our draft policy, but infrastructure-heavy interventions like embankments and dams have been pushed again.
• Though the policy does not say a word about increasing the soil moisture content, which actually should be the first objective of all irrigation strategies, it supports and even encourages inter-basin water transfers from so called ‘open basins’ to ‘closed basins’. This is highly inappropriate. Firstly we need to assess and exhaust the potential of sustainable options like watershed development, local water harvesting systems, rooftop and other rainwater harvesting methods, local ground water recharge, demand side management, including water saving methods like SRI, SSI (Sustainable Sugarcane Initiative), water saving cropping patterns, and also avoid non-essential water intensive activities, recycling by water intensive industries and so on. In the absence of such concerted efforts in any basin of the country, and in the face of the high inefficiency, social and ecological impacts of large infrastructure projects, such encouragement to inter basin transfers is unviable and unacceptable.
• The section on project planning and implementation begins, as expected directly with large multipurpose infrastructure projects, without even mentioning the appropriateness of the subsidiarity principle. After making a number of oft-repeated, bland statements about participation, etc, it goes on to make a shocking statement that all ‘All water resources projects, including hydro power projects, should be planned to the extent feasible as multi-purpose projects with provision of storage’. This is a dangerous statement to make. Giving such a privileged position to such mega storage options is uncalled for, when other storage options (e.g. increasing soil capacity to retain moisture, local storage, underground storage) and optimum use of existing storage capacities can be explored. On the other hand, there is need for an assessment of the benefits from existing projects to ensure how they can be optimised. There is a huge potential which should be acknowledged and prioritised. Secondly, there is need for basin-wide carrying capacity, cumulative impact assessment studies in each basin in a credible independent way to ensure that unviable capacities and storage is not added.
• The section on Institutional Arrangements also has some unpleasant surprises. It begins with the statement that Water Resources Regulatory Authorities (WRRA) are a must in each state. WRRA was first established in Maharashtra in 2005 through the MWRRA Act. The centralised, top down bureaucratic authority with no space for community / citizen representation has been ineffective in achieving any worthwhile objective or making water resources management pro-poor or pro-environment or stopping inter-sector water allocation. The Act has now been amended by an ordinance which gives rights of water allocation to the Cabinet, which chose to change water allocation from farmers on verge of suicides in Vidarbha to thermal power plants. So what is the basis on which WRRAs are being pushed for, in the National Water Policy, apart from the fact that it is pushed by the World Bank ?
• A most shocking statement in the Policy is the assertion that “The “Service Provider” role of the state has to be gradually reduced and shifted to regulation and control of services. The water-related services should be transferred to community and / or the private sector...” “Public Private Partnership” model under the general superintendence of the State or the stakeholders. This seems to be a blanket go ahead for water privatisation, which has been proven to be anti-people, anti-poor and pro private water utilities and hence unacceptable. Privatisation has not succeeded anywhere and is not likely to succeed in any case in India, and will only work towards worsening the water services scene, particularly for the poor, but actually for everyone. More so when we have no credible mechanisms to ensure transparent, accountable water resources management, nor do we have laws to ensure legally enforceable right to water and democratic norms.
• Another major problem is the sketchy mention of groundwater and very little concerted attention given to the issue. As is clear to everyone from the mounting dependence on groundwater in every water sub-sector in India, groundwater is the real water lifeline of India, be it the urban or the rural sector, agriculture or industries, and it was expected that the policy will state the acute problems faced by the sector and put forth concrete steps of overcoming these and conserving the resource, which has not happened.

The attention given in the Draft NWP 2012 to information sharing, climate change, priority to basic human needs and ecosystems are welcome, but these may remain at superficial lip service level without clearly defined norms and credible mechanisms to achieve these objectives.

On the whole, the anti-farmer, pro-private company, anti-poor stance of the current draft is disappointing and it seems the water resources establishment has refused to learn lessons from the past. There has been only a notional attempt at a democratic process in the formulation of the new draft policy and it seems an opportunity that comes once in a generation may be lost if we hurry too much to proceed without open, publicised consultations right down to gram sabha level.

We urge the water resources establishment, including the Union Ministry of Water Resources, Central Water Commission and the Planning Commission to reinstate a credible participatory, democratic process for formulating new National Water Policy in the changing climate, keeping societal and ecosystemic sustainability and equity in mind. A mere 29 days period for comments from the date of publication, that too when the draft policy is put up only on the website, seems too less, for ground concerns to be able to reach the administration [3].

Download this press release from the SANDRP website here.

Last date for sending comments on the Draft Policy to the Ministry of Water Resources (MoWR) is 29th Feb 2012. Comments should be sent by email to: nwp2012-mowr@nic.in.

For more information, please contact:

Himanshu Thakkar (ht.sandrp@gmail.com),
Parineeta Dandekar (parineeta.dandekar@gmail.com)

References

1. National Water Policy 2012 (English) and National Water Policy 2012 (Hindi) and the Ministry's press release.

2. Minutes of consultative meetings held over 2010-11, to develop the National Water Policy 2012.

Guest Post : Md. Khalequzzaman

The Indian government and two other Indian authorities have signed an agreement on October 22, 2011 regarding construction of the Tipaimukh Dam. Since the announcement was published in the news media, there has been a lot of discussion and debate about the potential impacts of the proposed Tipaimukh dam on the economy and environment of Bangladesh in general, and on the haor (wetlands that are breeding ground for fish and are cultivated for rice crops) region in particular.

This debate has intensified following publication of an article by Adviser Gawher Rizvi in the Daily Star on December 13, 2011 (http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=213834) in which he called for a science-based analysis of the proposed project and its potential impact on Bangladesh.

For lack of field-based data and paucity of cooperation between India and Bangladesh on information about the project, it is difficult to make a sound judgment on the impact of this project.  However, based on other experience and track record on impacts of large dams on the environment and ecosystem in downstream regions, some inferences can be made. The following points about potential negative impacts of the proposed Tipaimukh Dam on downstream region in Bangladesh have been formulated based on the knowledge of hydrology and published information in the electronic and press media.

The Tipaimukh Dam will retain about 15 billion cubic meters (BCM) of water at peak level, which is about 31% of the total flow of water that enters Bangladesh through Barak into Surma-Kushiyara-Meghna rivers. Therefore, it is completely unacceptable to Bangladesh that India will have unilateral control over 31% of the water in a shared river. Many people (Advisor Gawher Rizvi, Water Minister Ramesh Shil, Foreign Minister Dipu Moni, etc.) in the government claim that they have all the necessary information on the Tipaimukh Dam, and the Indian government (including Dr. Manmohan Singh) reassured them on numerous occasions that they (India) will not do anything to harm Bangladesh. This logic is unacceptable for many reasons:

(a) India should not decide what is good for Bangladesh and her people without taking them into confidence. If India’s intention was to help Bangladesh then they would have studied all environmental and economic impacts jointly with Bangladesh before initiating this project;

(b) India did not even inform Bangladesh about this project before they signed an agreement on Oct. 24, 2011. They are in clear violation of all laws, policies, and agreement that are practiced on shared international rivers. Article IX of the Ganges Treaty clearly demands such co-operation and prior consent from all stakeholders. If Bangladeshi news media did not raise this issue, then India would not even bother to mention it to anyone (including the government) about the project;

(c) Indian government has issued the environmental clearance certificate on October 24, 2008 and they are going ahead with the project despite serious objections from Bangladesh and Indian environmental groups (as well as indigenous people in Manipur and Mizoram).  In their environmental analysis, they never carried out any study in Bangladesh, especially in the Haor region to understand the natural ecosystems that exist that depend on natural flow of water in Surma-Kushiyara-Meghna and their numerous tributaries.  How can India assume (without any study in Bangladesh) that they will not cause any harm to the environment and ecosystem in downstream region in Bangladesh?  This assumption is not based on science – it is purely a guessing game. How can 40 million people living in Haor regions of greater Sylhet and Mymensingh rely on Indian assurance that is not based on any scientific study?

Tipaimukh Dam - Run-of-the-river project?

India claims that the Tipaimukh Dam is a run-of-the-river project and no water will be diverted for irrigation, and therefore, no harm will be done to Bangladesh. This is a flawed logic because:

(a) They will have to fill up the reservoir that holds 15 BCM of water, out of which about 8 BCM will be dead storage (i.e. will remain behind the dam permanently to maintain needed pressure to run turbines. If this 8 BCM water is released over 365 days in a year then it amounts to about 17,000 cu sec, which is a huge amount for the Surma-Kushiyara-Meghna rivers in dry season. As result of the dam, the flow characteristics and water release schedule will be different as compared to the flow that existed before the dam was built. Now the question is, how does anyone in Bangladesh know what that water release schedule will be after the dam is completed? No one in Bangladesh (maybe even in India) really knows how much water will have to be released on a daily basis for proper operation of the hydroelectric project. Can the Haor people live with this uncertainty to grow their crops? The answer is obviously NO;

(b) The life, livelihood, and ecosystems in Haor region have established an equilibrium with the natural flow of the rivers, and the farmers prepare their field in harmony with this natural flow regime. Now, if this natural flow regime is altered then farmers will not be able to prepare their land for boro cultivation on time, and the whole agricultural production may be jeopardized. On the other hand, if India releases way too much water in dry season then farmers will not have access to their land since these lands will be under unusual amount of water. In the rainy season, the opposite may happen. If the dam is completely full, then they will release water at their own will to save the dam.

One can argue that there are Indians in the downstream regions of Assam, Nagaland, and Manipur, and India will not release extra water to cause flooding for them. It might be true, but we will not know the extent of flooding in India and how many people will be affected if no joint venture research is done. Besides, Indian government can make plan to remove their own people before releasing additional water, because they will make the decision about water release beforehand, which they may or may not share with Bangladesh.

Tipaimukh Dam - Joint venture project?

India has offered Bangladesh the possibility of investing in the project and buy electricity from it, which is not acceptable on the following counts:

(a) If India was serious about a joint venture project then they would not sign an agreement with three Indian entity and set a deadline of 87 months for completion of the project. They would not issue the environmental clearance without involving environmental study in Bangladesh first.  So, it is safe to conclude that they are just doing lip service – they are not serious about any joint venture project;

(b) There is no treaty between India and Bangladesh about joint management of water resources in Barak-Surma-Kushiyara. If even Bangladesh invests money in the project, India will decide unilaterally how much water they will release and when they will release it;

(c) Since the Barak-Surma-Kushiyara is an international river system, Bangladesh should not pay for electricity, India should provide a fair share to Bangladesh for free as they agreed to provide some electricity to Manipur for free as a stakeholder. More importantly, Bangladesh should find other means to produce electricity – not by destroying the agriculture and ecosystem in the Haor region;

(d) On December 21, the government of Bangladesh signed 4 separate agreements with private investors to set up four power plants (3 coal-fired and one solar) to generate 1105 MW of electricity, which will cost a total of $1.7 billion or Tk. 112 billions, i.e. about Tk. 11 crores for each 1 MW of electricity (The Daily Star, December 21, 2011), which is very similar in content when compared to the proposed Tipaimukh dam in the sense that both of these projects are designed to generate electricity, and both of these projects are similar in magnitude. In other words, four power plants in Bangladesh will generate 1105 MW, while the Tipaimukh will generate maximum of 1500 MW of electricity. However, it is ironic that the Govt. of India is risking so much resentment and opposition from both India and Bangladesh to implement a project that is designed to generate merely 1500 MW at a cost of Rs. 6,979 million ($1.4 billion), which is not a much bigger project than the ones the Govt. of Bangladesh just signed with private companies!

Since the coal-fired power plants in Bangladesh will be constructed by private companies, there is a margin of profit factored into the cost. If the government could build these power plants using domestic resources (either coal or natural gas) then the total cost would be much less. Although the cost per MW of electricity produced is slightly less for the Tipaimukh dam as compared to the coal-fired power plants ($0.93 million per MW vs. $1.53 million per MW, respectively), environmental and political costs of the Tipaimukh hydel project clearly will outweigh the benefits. This cost to benefit analysis indicates that if the Tipaimukh dam is constructed solely to generate electricity then its benefit will be marginal; and if the environmental and rehabilitation (not to mention the political and seismic hazard) costs are factored into the project then the total cost of electricity will be much higher. Consequently, it can be concluded that there must be other plans and intention to make this controversial hydel project worthwhile for the Indian government. One of such intentions might be construction of water-diversion barrages at a downstream location in the future (such as the Fulertal Barrage proposed in the Sukla Commission Report).

Considering the murky nature of the project, it will be unwise on the part of the government of Bangladesh to enter into a joint investment plan as proposed by the government of India for the Tipaimukh dam project. By investing in the this project, Bangladesh will waive all her rights to complain against future environmental and economic devastation that the dam may inflict on Bangladesh and her people. Two independent studies in Bangladesh clearly pointed out potential impacts of Tipaimukh Dam on the environment, hydrology, fisheries, agriculture, navigation, and ecosystems. Bangladesh should not enter into any joint venture investment for this ill-conceived, poorly studied, and controversial project. The geological, environmental, ecological, political and socio-economic costs of the Tipaimukh dam hydel project is prohibitive; and it will be unwise for Bangladesh to be a party to this project without first carrying out a joint environmental impact analysis of the project.

Adviser Gawher Rizvi wrote that since the Tipaimukh Dam is 140 miles away from Bangladesh border its impact will be minimal on Bangladesh. The truth couldn’t be farther from this. Barak-Surma-Kushiyara is a continuous river and it empties in the Bay of Bengal through the Meghna River. Therefore, any interference with water flow will be felt all the way to the Bay of Bengal. For example, the Farakka Barrage is over 100 miles from the shoreline in Bangladesh, but its negative impacts on the salinity intrusion and the water level in the Gorai and other rivers in SW Bangladesh are documented facts. A similar situation will occur in the greater Mymensingh and Sylhet districts should water is diverted from Barak through any barrage (such as the proposed Phulertal Barrage in Assam). Salinity will encroach up the Meghna-Kalini-Kushiyara-Surma-Gorautra rivers farther inland, impacting the agriculture and fisheries in parts of Habiganj, Kishoreganj, Netrokona, Sunamganj, Sylhet districts.

Flow in Bangladesh to increase in summer months?

As a part of Flood Action Plan (FAP-6) study, it was concluded that if the Tipaimukh Dam is completed then the flow in Bangladesh will increase in summer months and will decrease in rainy season.  This finding is questionable on the following accounts:

(a) Since India has not completed the dam they don’t have any water release schedule yet, and if even they did have a tentative schedule then it is not clear as to when and how they shared this information with Bangladeshi authority.  Therefore, the FAP-6 is carried out based on many assumptions, which may or may not be true.  In fact, Ainun Nishat clearly admitted that their study was done based on many unknowns and assumptions;

(b) As mentioned before, any departure from natural flow regime will mean adjustments for farmers and fishermen in the Haor region in terms of timing for  preparation of their agricultural fields, planting of seeds, and harvesting the crops. There is no guarantee that this disturbance in natural flow will bring positive feedback for the Haor region.  Most importantly, the people of Bangladesh will have to rely on the mercy and decision of Indian authority for the fair share or necessary amount of water needed for their life and livelihood.  The natural flow of the Surma-Kushiyara-Meghna should be warranted for the well being of the people and existence of Bengal delta which has been fed by water and sediments of Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna river system during its entire existence throughout the geologic time

Tipaimukh Dam is not the only water control structure that India is to build that will negatively impact the life and livelihood of Bangladesh. India has already completed 16 hydel projects in NE states, and has plan to build over 100 dams, which are at various stages of development, including Tipaimukh, Teesta, Loktak, Subansiri, Kameng, and Ranganadi. Plans for most of these projects are moving along smoothly without much objection from our government. Since these dams are not inside the mainland of India, the mainstream Indian media and environmentalists are not as vocal about their impacts. The Brahmaputra Board makes recommendations and National Hydroelectric Power Corporation, NE Electric Power Corporation (NEEPCO), Central Electric Authority (CEA), Department of Development of NE Region (DONER) along with the state governments are involved in those projects. There are 22 schemes identified within the Brahmaputra basin alone (Source:  Manju Menon, 2005). These projects will have detrimental impacts on floods, agriculture, fisheries, wetlands (haors, beels, mangroves, etc.) on a long run. The current Indian govt. is following the footsteps of the BJP-lead govt. in water resources management under various banners, such as "50,000 MW initiatives" or National Water and Power Development Plan. The government of Bangladesh needs to discuss the future of all shared rivers in developing an integrated water resources management plan involving all co-riparian nations. Let the rivers flow freely.

Md. Khalequzzaman, Ph.D.
Dept. of Geology & Physics
Lock Haven University
Lock Haven, PA 17745, USA

email: mkhalequ@lhup.edu