MP: Spillway to release water from Gandhi Sagar dam into Aahu river

The water resource departments of Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan are planning to construct a 40-km-long spillway to discharge excess water from Gandhi Sagar dam into Aahu river in Rajasthan’s Jhalawar district.

The water resource departments of Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan are planning to construct a 40-km-long spillway to discharge excess water from Gandhi Sagar dam into Aahu river in Rajasthan’s Jhalawar district.

Spillway is a channel-like structure for discharge of excess water from a river body. (HT photo)

Spillway is a channel-like structure for discharge of excess water from a river body.

The project has been taken up on the suggestions of Central Water Commission to ease pressure on four old dams — Gandhi Sagar dam, Rana Pratap Sagar dam, Jawahar Sagar Dam and Kota Barrage of Chambal river basin.

Executive engineer of Madhya Pradesh water resource department, JPK Gupta, said, “The dams on Chambal river system are more than five decades old now, with average age of each dam considered to be 100 years. At this point, it is very essential to ease pressure on these dams.”

“Of late, effects of climate change can be seen in the region in terms of excessive rains. It has been observed in the past few years that rainfall received in a week equals that received annually earlier. In such a case, Chambal River receives 10 – 16 lakh cusecs in a single day. Such heavy pressure can damage the dams and flood surrounding regions,” Gupta told HT.

“The project is in its preliminary stages where we will conduct ground survey, followed by a technical survey and submit reports to state governments. It is anticipated that 25 kilometres of the channel will be in Rajasthan while the rest will be in Madhya Pradesh,” said the executive engineer.