The avoidable flood disaster brought in Gujarat and upstream Madhya Pradesh, starting from the night of Sept 16, 2023 by unaccountable operation of the Sardar Sarovar Project (SSP) Dam has created unimaginable impacts for lakhs of people in several districts, the full contours of the damage are still not fully available. But another intriguing aspect of this man-made disaster has come to light. Shockingly, there was no power generation at the 1200 MW River Bed Power House (RBPH) of the SSP from Sept 6 to Sept 16. This not only means loss of power generation of about 270 million units (MU), worth over Rs 80 Crores even at low price of Rs 3 per unit), but also it would have meant release of 1200 cumecs or, 42000 cusecs and over ten days, this would have meant reduction of about 12000 cumecs or 4.2 lakh cusecs from peak discharge for 24 hours, and this itself would have hugely reduced the flood disaster.
Continue reading “Avoidable flood disaster from unaccountable Sardar Sarovar operation: Why was River Bed Power House stopped since Sept 6?”Tag: Ankaleshwar
How SSNNL violated its own Flood Memorandum 2020 during recent SSD induced floods
During the recent Sardar Sarovar Dam (SSD) induced flood disaster in areas downstream of the dam in Gujarat, the dam operator, SSNNL (Sardar Sarovar Narmada Nigam Limited) violated its own Flood Memorandum (FM) 2020[i] in multiple ways.
The FM-2020 titled “Disaster Management Plan – 2020” provides detailed information about how the dam operation is to be done during South West Monsoon 2020, that is from June 1, 2020 to Oct 15, 2020, or whenever the monsoon has withdrawn. It is published by SSNNL’s Flood Control Cell and carries the names of six highest functionaries of SSNNL on second page: Chairman, Managing Director, Jt MD, Director (CAD), Director (Canal) and Director (Civil). It says Officer in charge of Flood Control Cell of SSNNL is Executive Engineer (Narmada Project Main Canal Division-2) and the FM-2020 is compiled by Superintending Engineer, Narmada Project Design Circle.
An earlier version of the Flood Memorandum for 2018[ii] is also available, which is useful as it has some additional information.
Continue reading “How SSNNL violated its own Flood Memorandum 2020 during recent SSD induced floods”
SANDRP 