Renewed interest in river-tapping project.

Even as there is a renewed interest in the much talked-about Paschimavahini (tapping the waters of the west-flowing rivers in the coast for drinking and irrigation), it appears the project is still far away even from conceptual stage.

While Dakshina Kannada Deputy Commissioner A.B. Ibrahim said there was no official report yet on the shape and nature of the project, academic circles and environmentalists are keen to know what the project is all about.

Lately, the project was brought to the limelight when the Chief Whip for the Opposition in the Legislative Council Ganesh Karnik said that Chief Minister Siddaramaiah had promised that it would be implemented.

The former Mangaluru City South MLA N. Yogish Bhat told The Hindu that he had prepared a report during his tenure as the Deputy Speaker of the Legislative Assembly in 2013 and it was estimated that the project would require about Rs. 700 crore. He said the project envisaged building check-dams across streams of 13 rivers in Dakshina Kannada, Udupi and Uttara Kannada districts so that a part of the water flowing into the sea is stored and used in summer months for irrigation and supplying drinking water. The drinking water problem could be solved permanently through this, he said.

S.G. Mayya, who recently retired as Professor with Department of Applied Mechanics and Hydraulics, NITK and specialises in Water Resources Engineering and Management, said the project should be given a comprehensive view. Entire basin of the river has to be taken as one unit and studied for parameters such as quantum of water available in different areas, the demand and how they are co-related with the flow, so that check dams at the estuary and at the top most region can maintain the water required for summer months.

The Hindu