Expedite Displacement Process To Start Work Song Dam Drinking Water Project: Uttarakhand CM Dhami
Affected families which are to be displaced should be provided land as soon as possible based on their consent - CM
While chairing of a meeting in the secretariat, Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami directed the officials to expedite the displacement process to start work on the Song Dam drinking water project. The affected families which are to be displaced should be provided land as soon as possible on the basis of their consent. All basic facilities should be provided to the families who will be displaced. If there is a need to construct community buildings, temples, roads and any other things, then they should be done on the basis of consent after talking to the affected families. The Chief Minister also directed to further expedite the work on the Jamrani Dam Project.
The Song Dam drinking water project will supply 150 MLD drinking water per day to about 11 lakh population of Dehradun city. This will also improve the groundwater level. About 15 thousand population of 10 villages located downstream of the dam will also be protected from floods.
Chief Secretary Radha Raturi, Secretary Shailesh Bagoli, Vinay Shankar Pandey, S.N. Pandey, Dr. R. Rajesh Kumar, Chief Forest Conservator Dr. Dhananjay Mohan, Additional Secretary Ranveer Singh Chauhan, Lalit Mohan Rayal, Chief Engineer of Irrigation Department Jaipal Singh and related officers were present in the meeting.
About the Project
The city of Dehradun is the most important town in the state of Uttaranchal and is on the tourist map of the country. The importance of this town has further been enhanced when it has been made capital of newly formed state. The tourists who visit Mussoorie and the pilgrims who visit the shrines of Badri, Kedar, Gangotri and Yamunotri, they do halt at Dehradun. This has put a tremendous pressure on the necessary amenities to be provided to the public. Water supply is one such amenity which has to be tackled in such a fashion that the system survives for long and takes care of future demand. Dehradun is facing shortage of water supply and the situation becomes more grave during summers when the discharge of rivers reduces.
According to the data furnished by Garhwal Jal Sansthan, Dehradun, there is shortage of 76.46 million litre of drinking water per day i.e. 27.90 million cubic metre per year. It is anticipated that this shortfall will go upto 256.02 million litre per day or 93.35 million cubic metre per year by the year 2051. Keeping this in view, it is proposed to collect the surplus water during monsoons by constructing a dam to solve the problem of drinking water for the city of Dehradun and adjoining areas.
The project envisages a dam of about 148.25 m height, one power house of 6.0 mw installed capacity near village kumalda. The tail water shall be released into the existing kalanga canal. By construction of the dam, some of the water will seep into the ground and supplement the ground water table which, in turn, will enhance the output of tubewells in the vicinity. As such this project will serve as multipurpose project for water supply, irrigation, tourism development, hydro-power generation and supplementing ground water table. (Source : Uttarakhand Irrigation Department)
