Bihar seeks water from Rihand, Bansagar dams

Patna: Bihar government has requested the Madhya Pradesh and UP governments to release its quota of water from Bansagar and Rihand dams, respectively, as farms in Bihar falling under Sone command area have dried up. Water resources department minister Vijay Kumar Chaudhary on Friday informed the state assembly that the principal secretary, WRD, on Friday had telephonic talks with his counterparts in the two states demanding release of the state’s quota of water. Chaudhary said he would himself talk to the WRD ministers of the two states soon.

The minister said the engineer-in-chief, WRD, had visited the Sone command areas recently and found Bihar was getting only 6,000 to 7,000 cft of water from Rihand, against its share of 14 lakh cft. Due to poor discharge of water from the dam, Bihar farmers were not getting water through Sone canal system, he said.

Chaudhary alleged the MP government was not cooperating with Bihar and not releasing its share of water from the reservoirs. The UP and MP governments were claiming there was insufficient rain in the catchment areas of Sone in their states, hence they were not discharging enough water from the dams to Bihar.

Earlier, the BJP and RJD members, while raising the plight of farmers in Bhojpur, Rohtas, Buxar and Kaimur districts during zero hour said water was not available for irrigation in Sone canal system and there was insufficient rain. They said paddy seedlings had dried up. Farmers were not getting power for operating their motor pumps, they complained.

Muni Devi and Sanjay Singh ?Tiger’ (both BJP), Dinesh Kumar Singh (RJD) and Rajeshwar Raj (JD-U), in their speeches, said the farmers were not getting water for irrigating their farms.

Bansagar agreement was signed between MP, Bihar and UP in 1973, under which Bihar is expected to receive 9,860 million cubic metres of water for irrigating 9.42 lakh hectares of land through Sone canal system. The Rihand water sharing agreement between UP and Bihar, which was signed in 1973, also provides for sharing of water between the two states. Farms in Arwal, Aurangabad and Gaya districts too are irrigated through Sone canal water.

Courtesy: TNN