Severe water crisis grips Himachal, a land

where Ravi, Beas, Chenab originate

Of the 9,524 natural water supply schemes in Himachal, 1,022 have dried up in the
past few years, affecting over 5.30 lakh people.

Indo-Asian News Service

New Delhi
May 30, 2018
UPDATED: May 31, 2018 19:13 IST

Activists say hydroelectric plants in Himachal Pradesh are responsible for water crises in
different parts of the state. (Photo: PTI)

HIGHLIGHTS
 Large parts of Shimla are reeling under acute water shortage.

 The crisis is aggravated with inflow of tourists.

 Many water supply schemes in the state are running dry.

Himachal Pradesh is home to rivers like Ravi, Beas, Chenab and Satluj. Except Satluj, which
originates in Tibet, rest all traces their origin in the lower Himalayas.
The state also prides itself in being one of India's leading centres for tourism. But climate change has
begun to make an impact if the water crisis in Shimla is any testimony.
As Shimla faces one of its worst water crises, sending locals on the warpath and making tourists
cutting short their stay, environmentalists warn water scarcity not only looms large over the city but
the entire Himalayan state.
Himdhara, a state-based environment research and action collective, on Wednesday said a massive
crisis is unfolding in the Himalayan rivers due to the upcoming hydropower projects.

The water crisis is despite the fact that Himachal Pradesh is home to a plethora of perennial
rivers originating in the Himalayas. (Photo: PTI)
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The water crisis unfolding in the state's various regions, especially Shimla, needs an urgent action
plan, Himdhara's Manshi Ahser told IANS.
Citing the organisation's "Dried and Dusted: A State of the Rivers Report for Himachal Pradesh", she
said upcoming hydropower projects, urbanization, spike in tourism, industrialisation, mining and, of
course, climatic change are affecting the Satluj, Ravi, Beas, Chenab and Yamuna river basins.
The 2017 report warns local ecology and livelihoods are threatened by 41 big hydro and dam projects
and 91 small and micro projects.
As per a 2015 report of the Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education of 2015, a total of
11,665.346 hectares in the state has been diverted for different development activities since 1980,
including 62 per cent of the forest land for hydropower projects and transmission lines.
ALSO READ | Shimla water crisis: No special tanker supply for VIPs, says HC
In the Satluj basin, there will 185 km of tunnels once all planned hydro projects are built, it says.
If all planned projects in Himachal Pradesh and across the Himalayas are constructed, there will be
hundreds of kilometres of tunnels underneath the mountains, through which most of the Ravi, Satluj,
Beas and Chenab waters will flow, and there will hardly be any long stretches of these rivers that will
be free-flowing, said Ahser.
In many cases, the distance between two hydro projects is less than a kilometre with some like
Rampur receiving water directly from the tail of upstream projects, impacting fish migration.
Then Additional Chief Secretary Avay Shukla, in a report to the Himachal Pradesh High Court's
'green bench' in August 2010, said out of the 70-km stretch of the Ravi between Chamba town and
Bajoli, only three km would be in its original bed and the rest would disappear in the tunnels of the
four sanctioned hydro projects - Bajoli-Holi, Kuther and Chamera II and III.
Painting a gloomy picture, a senior government functionary, requesting anonymity, said out of the
state's 9,524 natural water supply schemes, as many as 1,022 schemes have dried up in the past few
years, affecting over 5.30 lakh people.
As many as 282 of these were in Mandi, followed by 262 in Shimla.
Photo: PTI
Civic body officials blame Shimla water shortage to leaks in the distribution network, a significant
portion of which dates from British times and diminishing water resources due to over-exploitation.
"There was too much pumping from the Gumma water source in the past few days to overcome the
water scarcity of Shimla... this also resulted in mass mortality of aquatic species, due to drastic fall in
the water level," said an official.
Seeking to draw the government's attention to the crisis, 15 major environmental groups, in an open
letter on March 21, called for protecting some smaller streams and tributaries, such as the Tirthan
river.
Similarly, some other streams like the Hul, which meets drinking water needs of Chamba town, need
to be declared as a "no-go zone" not only for hydro projects but also for large-scale sand mining and
unplanned construction of roads and buildings, they said.