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09 Chapter 1
09 Chapter 1
,C H A P T E R - I
INTRODUCTION
1.1 PREFACE
1.2 HYPOTHESIS
The concept of a region has evoked more discussion or set in motion more
conflicting currents of opinion. The regions exist in the nature and 'that
the world can be easily marked off into such regions which are homogeneous
concept of a region has gone even further indeed and endowed their regions
with various qualities, ranging from the simple assertion that regions are
The regions are not given facts which can be discovered by research. For
no answer in the nature" says Hettner. The choice must be made by geogra
no universally valid division which does justice to all phenomena. One can
ting the boundaries of planning regions when such problems are being studied,
the river basin.The advantage occuring from a successful river basin planning
content of the area concerned. For operating such scheme there have to
usually obtains; thus foregoing ties which bind the various parts of drainage
basin into a concrete unit.
management. Critics, who will point out the essential dissimilarity between
the upper and lower parts of the basin in several respects, may be reminded
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that, if those parts lack. unity of form they are, nevertheless, integrated
Therefore the present planning units and the processes seem to be inadequate
to achieve the goals envisaged in the plan.A geographic unit with strong
and management to fulfil the needs of the society by maintaining the ecologi
Thus an attempt is being made here in the following pages to carry out
thi^ a case study of Warana river basin. To reveal the terrain characteristics,
1.2 HYPOTHESIS
All planning processes developed and implemented till recently were made
like tahsil, district etc. which have been creating specific political motivation
like river basin eco-system. In the present planning system a river valley
eco-systems. Therefore, a planning exercise must take into account the physi
cal, social, economic and ecological components of the river basin eco-system
strutures govern by the stream courses which further control the process
and wind regulate flow of water, sediment drains and the energy cycles
apt , as this way of dealing with the physical and human resources would
River Warana is one of the important right bank tributaries of mighty river
Krishna. It originates in the Sahyadri range, the western ghats near Patharpunj
plateau in Patan taluka of Satara district and joins the major river Krishna
at Haripur near Sangli after traversing a length of 149 Kms. The Warana
river basin is an inter district basin spreading between Sangli and Kolhapur
districts.
River Kadavi and river Morana are two important tributaries of river Warana.
The river Warana arises in Sahyadri near Prachitgad at an altitude of 914
M. and runs eastward to meet Krishna at an altitude of 548 M. The river
Kadavi is easterly flowing tributary which arises in' Sahyadri at an altitude
700.79 M. near village Amba and flows for about 35.40 km. and joins river
Warana near Sagaon. River Kadavi flows parallel to the river Warana. It
f!ank.Thls tributary rises from a place very near to the ' Dhamanwada
hill-knot' near Kondaiwadi village and flow between southerly and south
easterly trending spurs. River Morana flows for about 27.35 kms and meets
the east. The eastern part of the basin is comparatively less rugged than
western part and possesses flat rolling topography. The basin comes in the
rainshadow zone of the western ghats and bears a temperature climate
receive water only in the monsson period hence they are non-perennial.
The geodetic location of the Warana basin is on the north western part
of the deccan shild. The latitudinal and longitudinal extension of the entire
basin is from 16°47'00"N to 17015'15nN and 73°30'45"E to 74°30'00"E
respectively. The total length of the basin is 149 kms and average width
is 21 kms. The total area of the basin is 2095.59 kms. The basin is
and Patan Taluka of Satara district. The villages are connected by metelled
and jordlnary district roads and village roads. There is no railway line and .
aerodrome within the basin. The nearest railway-stations for the basin are
In warana river basin one major, two medium and many minor irrigation
projects are under construction. The major Warana irrigation project of34
TMC is under construction at Chandoli on Warana river.Out of the two mediun
distituting 4730 souls. The land of command area of major project comes
in the present study region and neighbouring Krishna and Panchaganga river
ment. The experiences gained from other dam projects e.g. Aswan Dam
on Nile suggest that the human interference in the natural river system
elves. The dynamic processes acting in the basin follow a particular set
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the relationships between the various parameters of the drainage basin. The
knowledge of the geomorphic character of the basin is essential for scientific
planning and management of the watershed or river basin. If the concept
nmental problems which are likely to crop-up in near future, due to construc
Since long back geo morphologists have been studying the dynamics of the
river system. Horton (1932,1945) contributed a new quantitative approach
The Contribution made by these scientists have given rise to the science
of regime of rivers.
t
Maddock and Leopold (1953) firstly considered that the river and the landscape
upon which it flows a dynamic system with several aspects. King (1966,1967)
supported this system approach and suggested that it helps in explaining
and enclosing canyons. Recently man has been heavily interferring this dynamic
system of river by constructing dams, weirs or changing ifs physical character
and even direction of flow for navigation and power generation or using
created serious problems. Particularly the impacts of dam are much conspicu
ous and of multifolded. Whclman (1964), Curry and Wahrhattigs (1967), Linken
et.al. (1970), Fisher et.al. (1968), Bormann (1969) have studied the river
basin systems to find out the impacts of human i n terferrence on the process
-es of sedimentation, water chemistry and effects on aquatic life. Keller
and Wert (1953) have been effected of deforestation oil Potomac river basin.
Abdin (1948), Brook and Rzoska (1954) have studied the impacts of Aswan
and other dams on Nile river.T.Blench (1971) have studied the changes in
‘ of the symposium entitled "River Ecology and Man " edited by Oglesby,
Carlson and McCann has been published in book form in which case studies
of different river basins of the world are given.A similar publication entitled
In India similar studies are being carried out with respect of various dam
basin of Chhota Nasgpur Plateau, of eastern India ". The upper Krishna basin
has also been studied by many workers from the view point of different
aspects. Pawar has studied, the impact of irrigation in upper Krishna basin.
Umerikar (1983) has studied the quaternary geology of upper Krishna basin.
The Botany Depatement of Shivaji University, Kolhapur has studied soil salinity
Science College , Karad has studied the chemistry of the Krishna river water
in its upper reaches to find out the causes of salt-built up In the basin.
In the National Seminar on "Ground Water and Lift Irrigation "(1978), Azer
Ansari, P.K. Midha and K.S. Das of ,CWPRS, Poona have presented a paper
River, Dist.Sangli, Maharashtra State ". But no work has been carried out
its use In the planning of physical and human resources of the basln.The
ecosystem.
growth.
1.7 METHODOLOGY
The methodology adopted for the present research work includes filed work,
laboratory work and cartography. The present research work is divided into
two parts :(1) The collection of essential data (2)Analysis and interpretation
of the data. The first hand data are obtained by field observations,collection
The Warana river basin is divided into two divisions for convenience of the
collection and analysis of ‘the data. These divisions correspond to two flanks
The methods which are used for gemorphological, geological and morphometric
ers. The data obtained from these exercises are applied to prepare a spatial
The predictive model can be used as a fascimile at other places with similar
The passage of the thesis can be described in four divisions. The first and
with the data collection regarding various environmental factors of the basin.
ental techniques for analysing and assessing the characters of various factors
of the basin eco-system. The fourth and last part of the thesis comprises
The first division covers preface of the thesis in which the concept of a
t
makes it clear that the river basins are homogeneous natural units which
for regional set-up, problem statement and the previous work. Then the
aim of study and methodology used for the research work is expressed and
lastly the plan of the thesis.The second part is devoted to physical and human
soil, vegetation livestock and human resources, land use and cropping pattern,
industries, transport and communication and energy sources. The complexity
and drainage patterns. The conspicuous geounits are main divides, plateaus,
down in the valley from high main divides of the basin. In the drainage
pattern the most peculier is the dentritic and parallel through out the course.
The geology of the region is not much complicated since almost the whole
basin is covered with basalt lava flows of Deccan Traps. Most of the geophe-
in the work to reveal the present state of physical and cultural environments
about resource potentials of the basin. More emphasis is given to the study
The third division of the thesis is spared for morphometric and environmental
studies of various aspects of the basin environment. The form and process
out the evolution of stage of the basin. The river is in maturity stage
upper reaches are erosional and the lower reaches are depositional.
and information with one another and also with their physical environment.
assessment is carried out of four major human activities in the basin i.e.
(i)The Warana Irrgation Dam ( a major project), (ii) Deforestation, (iii) Existing
agro industries and (iv) The population growth in the basin. On the basis
of the basin. The traditional agricultural crops which are very poor in yield
basin.
suggested in this research work will help in developing the river basin
ecosystems without disterbing its ecological balance which will also lead