Cloud Burst

Uttarakhand Cloud Bursts in Monsoon 2019: No Doppler Radars Six Years Since 2013 Disaster

With the beginning of south west monsoon season 2019, many Himalayan states started witnessing exceptional rainfall events known as Cloud Bursts. The extreme weather event – like previous years- caused large scale destruction in ecologically sensitive and remotely located vulnerable hilly areas. This account compiles the available information about such incidents in Uttarakhand in 2019 SW monsoon.

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DRP News Bulletin

DRP: 9 Dec 2019: CITIZENS REPORT ON WHAT AILS GANGA REJUVENATION

 The Hindustan Times editorial on Nov 27, 2019 has rightly said the following about “a recently-released Rejuvenating-Ganga River – A Citizen-Report, by the India Rivers Week, a consortium of seven NGOs”.

“A key reason for the failure of the river cleaning projects (Ganga and Yamuna action plans), says a recently-released citizen’s report, Rejuvenating Ganga,by the India Rivers Week, a consortium of seven NGOs, was their single-point focus on the main stem of the river, while the Ganga basin actually has eight major rivers (Yamuna, Son, Ramganga, Gomti, Ghaghra, Gandak, Kosi and Damodar). The majority of the funds were spent on pollution-abatement measures on the main stem of the Ganga and on the upper Yamuna basin, which constitute just 20% of the Ganga basin.”

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DRP News Bulletin

DRP: 2 Dec. 2019: SC says Municipal Commissioners to be prosecuted under WP Law

In a number of ways the Supreme Court order this week that the municipal commissioners and chief officers can be prosecuted for releasing untreated pollutants from the cities to the rivers and other water bodies is path breaking. Can it help fix accountability of release of such untreated sewage? Can it help ensure that cities stop doing this and cities not only have adequate sewage treatment facilities, but also that cities have to ensure that the STPs function to ensure that no untreated sewage ends up the rivers and other water bodies?

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Urban Water Sector

Chandigarh: Faidan Pind Drain Shows Ugly Side of ‘City Beautiful’

Union Territory of Chandigarh enjoys ‘City Beautiful’ tag for better planned urban development. Undoubtedly the city has wide roads, abundant green patches, well planned residential sectors, public amenities, cyclist tracks etc.; however dumping of solid waste and untreated sewage around its periphery shows that the city performs poorly in managing its water and natural sources.

The story of Faidan Nizampur also known as Faidan Pind drain near Airport is an apt example showing that while city manages to get beautiful tag, the rivulets and lives of people around it have turned miserable by increasing pollution load and other issues.

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DRP News Bulletin

DRP: 18 Nov. 2019: River capacities are changing, but who is monitoring?

River carrying capacity is such a crucial factor in deciding if certain areas will be flooded and with what severity. This capacity is constantly changing, more so in tropical climate and high silt carrying rivers of South Asia, as new research shows. However, most models that are used in India, including by CWC, assume steady state situation. Nor are there constant and credible efforts to assess the river cross sections and river conveyance capacities and put them in public domain. The study shows how important it is that we wake up to this reality and ensure credible, consistent monitoring and assessments by credible independent agencies at the earliest. This has become even more urgent, the study underlines, since in changing climate, the rainfall patterns are changing fast. 

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CWC - Central Water Commission

2019 All India summary of CWC flood forecasting sites

This article provides and overview of flood forecasting work of Central Water Commission (CWC) in 2019 after looking closely at each site details for the five regions of India: North East[i], East[ii], North[iii], West[iv] and South[v] India.

The table below provides an overview of number of Level Forecasting, Level Monitoring and Inflow forecasting sites as per CWC’s FF website during 2019 floods for all the states and regions of India.

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Dam floods · Dam Induced Flood Disaster · Dam Safety

2019 Monsoon: Instances when Dam Safety Came into Question

The South West Monsoon in 2019 in India brought the highest rainfall of last 25 years and issues related to heavy rainfall continue even to the end of October 2019. Here we have listed major instances during the monsoon when there were question marks over safety of dams either due to structural safety or due to wrong operations of the dams. Some issues of breaches of embankments/ canals are also included here. As we can see, the instances come from across the country, including North East, North, West, Centre, South.

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CWC - Central Water Commission

Rivers That Reached New Highest Flood Level during Monsoon 2019

In the monsoon season of 2019 Indian rivers have crossed Highest Flood Level (HFL) at around 37 Level Forecasting and Level Monitoring sites across the country. This account attempts basin wise details and description of HFL breached by the rivers.   

Brahmaputra Basin (Assam)

In Brahmaputra basin 2 sites, 1 Aie NH Xing Level Monitoring site on River Aie in Barpeta district of Assam and Dhubri (Level Forecast) site on River Brahmaputra in Dhubri district of Assam narrowly crossed the HFL in July 2019.

Also River Barak at ANIPUR   site in Karimganj district on May 24 and River Brahmaputra at Goalpara site in Goalpara district rose close to the HFL level on July 17, 2019. As per CWC (Central Water Commission) FF Website, Goalpara site has not crossed HFL since 1954.

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DRP News Bulletin

DRP: 28 Oct 2019: Growing opposition to Large Hydro Projects

As can be seen from the news reports from Jammu & Kashmir, Assam, Arunchal Pradesh, Karnataka, among others, the opposition to Large Hydro Projects and Big Dam is growing all over India. These projects are neither economically viable, nor Socially-environmentally sustainable. There are much better options exist and hope the governments takes informed, democratic decisions. Going by the agenda and minutes of the recent Expert Appraisal Committee on River Valley Projects and other decisions, this hope seems far fetched at the moment.

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DRP News Bulletin

DRP: 21 Oct. 2019: Opposition to restarting work on Lower Subansiri HEP without addressing Assam people’s concerns

With work on NHPC Ltd’s 2,000-MW Lower Subansiri hydro power project restarting after a wait of almost eight years, anti-dam organisations led by the All Assam Students’ Union (AASU) and Krishak Mukti Sangram Samiti (KMSS) vowed to launch an intense resistance movement to stop further construction of the project. AASU, in a statement, alleged that work on the Lower Subansiri project at Gerukamukh along the Assam-Arunachal Pradesh border has been started ‘treacherously’, risking the lives and property of people living in the downstream area. AASU said a scientific study on the possible impact of the dam in its downstream areas besides a cumulative impact study must be completed before expediting work at the dam site.

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