Kalabagh Dam

The Kalabagh dam is a mega water reservoir that Government of Pakistan planning to develop across the river Indus, one of the world's largest rivers. The proposed site for the dam is situated at Kalabagh in Mianwali District of the north-west Punjab province, bordering NWFP.

The dam project is a highly controversial and has been so since its inception. In December 2005, General Pervez Musharraf, who became the President of Pakistan after a 1999 coup, announced that he would definitely build the dam in the larger interest of Pakistan.

Kalabagh Dam Key Facts

Name	Kalabagh
Dam Type	Earthfill
Height (above riverbed)	260 feet
Length	11,000 feet
Area at retention level	164 miles²
Catchment Area	110,500 miles²
Gross Storage Capacity	7.9 MAF
Live Storage Capacity	6.1 MAF
Dead Storage	1.8 MAF
Retention Level	915 feet amsl
Main Spillway Capacity	1.07 million cusecs
Design Flood Discharge	1.92 million cusecs
Hydropower Generation	3,600 MW
Maximum Discharge	1.2 million cusecs (in 1929)
Total Volume of Dam	34 million cubic yards

History

The region of Kalabagh was once an autonomous jagir (feudal estate) within Punjab. It was annexed by the Sikhs in 1822. After the British annexed the Punjab, the Nawab of Kalabagh was granted the jagir of Kalabagh, in recognition of his services to the British Raj.

According to the PC-II of the Project, Kala Bagh dam was initiated by GOP in 1953, and until 1973, the project was basically considered as a storage project for meeting the irrigation needs, and consequently, rapid increases in the cost of energy have greatly enhanced the priority of the dam as a power project.

The project's paperwork was finalized in March, 1984, with the assistance of the United Nations Development Programme; supervised by the World Bank, for the client Water and Power Development Authority (WAPDA) of Pakistan.

Controversy

The proposed construction of the Kalabagh Dam triggered an extremely bitter controversy among the four provinces of Pakistan, namely Punjab, Sindh, North-West Frontier Province, and Balochistan.

Only Punjab, which is the most populous province, favours the dam. The other three provinces have expressed extreme dissatisfaction, going so far as to have their provincial assemblies pass unanimous resolutions condemning the proposed dam. Hence, the project is still under consideration.

The delay is also being caused by the fact that according to international water distribution law, the tailender has a legal and natural right on river and that is why no mega construction or reservoir can be built without permission and endorsement of the tailender i.e. Sindh. In the case where the tailender is not using water i.e. building a water reservoir, a reservoir can be made upstream.

Impact assessments of the proposed dam have shown that while it will provide storage and electricity, the dam will also have adverse impacts on the environment, as can be expected from any large dam. It will also displace a large number of people. While proponents point to the benefits, the adverse factors have been played up by the opponents of the dam. As a result, the dam has been stalled by claims and counterclaims since 1984.

The controversy can be best understood by looking at the viewpoints of each of the four provinces.

Punjab viewpoint

Punjab — the granary of Pakistan - desperately needs more water to keep up with the growing population and industrial demands on its agriculture. A dam at Kalabagh would also supply cheap hydro-electric power.

The annual outflow of water into the Arabian Sea is considered a "waste" in Punjab, which feels that water can be used to irrigate Pakistani infertile lands.

Punjab wants not just Kalabagh, but also two more large dams on the Indus, at Bhasha and Skardu/Katzarah. It feels that the Kalabagh site is the most favourable, compared to the other two, and that it should be built first.

Sindh viewpoint

The province of Sindh, which is the lower riparian, has always been the strongest opponent of the proposed dam. It has many objections at the proposed dam, some of the important are as follows.

File:SukkurBarrage.jpg

The Sukkur barrage at Indus river, Sindh

First, Sindh objects that their share of the Indus waters will be curtailed as water from the Kalabagh will go to irrigate farmlands in Punjab and NWFP, at their cost. Sindhis hold that their rights as the lower riparian have precedence according to international water distribution law.

Second, the coastal regions of Sindh require a constant flow of water down the Indus into the Arabian Sea so that the flowing water can keep the seawater from intruding inland. Such seawater intrusion would literally turn vast areas of Sindh's coast into an arid saline desert, and destroy Sindh's coastal mangroves.

With the construction of dams, such as Mangla Dam and Tarbela Dam across the Indus, Sindhis have seen the once-mighty Indus turned into a shadow of its former glory downstream of the Kotri Barrage up to Hyderabad. They fear that there simply is not enough water for another large dam across the Indus, let alone three.

The Kalabagh site is located in a highly seismic zone near an active fault, and the underlying rocks are likely to contain numerous fractures, causing the reservoir water to seep through the catacomb of fractures and discharge at the lowest point around the reservoir and the Indus river. [1]

Damming the Indus has already caused a number of environmental problems that have not yet addressed. Silt deposited in the proposed Kalabagh dam would further curtail the water storage capacity of Manchar Lake and other lakes and of wetlands like Haleji Lake.

President General Musharraf and other leaders, such as Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, have promised 'iron-clad' constitutional guarantees to ensure that Sindh gets its fair share of water. However, these assurances mean little to most Sindhis, who point out that

even the earlier 1991 Indus Water-Sharing Accord has been violated, in their opinion, and that Punjab has "stolen" their water.

The objection to Kalabagh in Sindh is widespread. Even political parties of Sindh that are in the central cabinet and support General Musharraf, such as the MQM, have strongly denounced the dam.

NWFP viewpoint

The NWFP has two main objections to the dam.

While the reservoir will be in the NWFP, the dam's electricity-generating turbines will be just across the provincial border in Punjab. Therefore, Punjab would get royalties from the central government in Islamabad for generating electricity. Contrary to this, however, Punjab has agreed not to accept any royalties from the Kalabagh Dam. The fact that the NWFP will suffer the adverse consequences of the reservoir but not get royalties is seen as unfair.

Concerns that large areas of Nowshera district would be submerged by the dam and even wider areas would suffer from waterlogging and salinity as has occurred with tarbela dam.

Balochistan viewpoint

The Baloch are not directly affected by the dam as such. Rather, most Baloch see the dam as another instance of Punjab lording it over the smaller provinces. By opposing the dam they are signalling their disaffection with being the smallest, least populous, and poorest province. Balochistan may get more water after the construction of Kalabagh Dam, due to the increase in water in the system.

Analysis

Most independent analysts believe that the foremost problem with the proposed dam at Kalabagh is one of a trust deficit between the Punjab on one side and the other three provinces on the other. The noted columnist, Ayaz Amir suggested that the people of Punjab should redefine their assumptions about the rest of Pakistan and distribution of resources. A layman of Punjab does not understand why the rest of Pakistan does not trust Punjab. The answer, according to Amir, lies in the frequent coups staged by the Pakistan Army (which is overwhelmingly Punjabi in its composition), as well as the Army's extra-constitutional intervention and influence in public sector and civil institutions of the country in general and Sindh in particular. Now no province is ready to trust the Punjab.

All Pakistanis agree that Pakistan faces a severe water shortage, and that some form of water management must be implemented soon. Many point out that even if work on Kalabagh were to start tomorrow, it would still take at least eight years to complete and commission such a large dam. In the meantime, the water situation would continue to worsen. Smaller dams, barrages, and canals must be built before that, and water conservation techniques introduced.

The WAPDA [2] for years repeatedly changed its statistics on the dam, to the point where no-one in Pakistan now believes any of its figures. Government of Pakistan formed a technical committee, headed by A. N. G. Abbasi, to study the technical merits of the Kalabagh dam vis-a-vis the other two. The four-volume technical report concluded that Bhasha or Katzarah dam should be built before Kalabagh, further complicating matters. To make matters even more complex, the report also stated that Kalabagh and Bhasha Dams could be considered feasible

The abrupt way in which President General Musharraf announced the decision to build the dam, simply overruling the objections of the smaller states, has sharply polarised public opinion. In Punjab the view is one of "...its high time!" while in the other states, especially Sindh, the reaction has been one of "...over my dead body!".

The fact that the General literally dragged so controversial an issue off the backburner and thrust it into national centre stage without considering the predictable reactions from the smaller provinces has left many aghast. Much has been said in the press, and the issue is still far from being resolved.

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