Polavaram Project Completion Impossible Before 2019 With Present Design: NHPC 

Srinivas G. Roopi

Hyderabad: The National Hydel Power Corporation (NHPC) has said that completion of Polavaram project is impossible before 2019 with its existing design. The NHPC suggested some crucial changes in the project design, which include completion of coffer dam in a single stage instead of pursuing it in a phased manner and that too before the next lean season by November, 2018.

Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu has time and again promised to the people of the state of completing the project before next elections in 2019.

A team of the NHPC conducted a study of the project from December 7 to 9 and submitted a report on December 27 suggesting some crucial changes to the project.

Polavaram project, located in Andhra Pradesh on Godavari river is a multipurpose project with irrigation, navigation and power generation as its purposes. The project is under construction by Andhra Pradesh Irrigation department and is being funded by Government of India through Polavaram Project Authority.

Embroiled in a host of problems and controversies right from its inception, Polavaram is unlikely to be completed before 2019 elections to the state Assembly, as claimed by the Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu time and again. Farmers and tribesmen complain about the complete absence of democratic procedure in the construction of the dam. In the Papi hills, where the project is being constructed, forests and villages are going to be submerged.

Located amidst the scenic Papi Hills of Andhra Pradesh, Polavaram lies on the Western bank of Godavari River which snakes through the two Telugu speaking states. The Papi Hills are the closest thing to the scenic mountain retreats that pepper the rest of South India. It hosts the pilgrim site of Bhadrachalam, where key episodes of the Ramayana are supposed to have taken place; on the other end of the project, the Papikonda Wild Life Sanctuary, home to a few rare species of birds is located.

But the Polavaram project will end up submerging all of this. Tourism has spiked in the last couple of years because tourists are worried that once the hills are submerged they’ll never get to see them again.

An Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) accorded in 2005 by the government suggests that over 276 villages in Andhra Pradesh are bound to be submerged, as well as eight and four in Odisha and Chhattisgarh respectively. This would involve over one lakh people being displaced directly owing to the project. In addition, 75,000 acres of cultivated land will be submerged, along with over 20,000 acres of fallow land and a few thousand acres of precious forest land.

Farmers are extremely unhappy about giving up their lands.

With a view to reduce cost of construction, PPA approached NHPC in November seeking its suggestions on design and methodology.

The team concluded that the diversion of river through spillway and completing the coffer dam up to 42.5 meters in the present lean season to facilitate supply of water to irrigation canal appears unlikely to be achieved. Hence, it is prudent that spillway is completed in all respect before start of next lean season--before November 2018--for initiating river diversion.

While stating that the construction of part of ECRF dam in zone of higher river bed level without u/s coffer dam is prima facie feasible, the team opined that the river should be diverted after full completion of spillway works.