Turmoil Over Water Diversion - The Ganga: Water Use in the Indian Subcontinent - page 138

Indian experts on the gains in river supplies between Farakka and Hardinge Bridge,
over and above the discharge from Farakka point, but as the observation site was
shifted to Paksey where the collected data related to a short period, the two sides
could not come to an agreed solution. Moreover, Bangladesh did not agree to cer-
tain basic facts about the Ganga. There are about 140 million acres of cultivable
land in the Ganga basin (about 6400 km long considering Ganga and its tributaries)
in India, where about 210 million people depend on the river. This area, India said,
experienced periodic scarcity and drought, as only 10% area was irrigated by the
Ganga and its tributaries. Apart from the agreed discharge through the Farakka bar-
rage for revival of Calcutta port, India needed more water for irrigation of arid areas.
Against this, only about 140 km of the Padma's flow go into Bangladesh, which is an
insignificant contribution to the flow of the river. Yet the whole of dry-season flow
is sought to be appropriated by Bangladesh for the entire four million acres of land,
claimed to be under the command of the Padma, at an intensity of over 210% in a
region where rainfall is abundant, and scarcity unknown. Table 9.2 illustrates this.
Table 9.2 shows that the share of water, demanded by India was quite justi-
fied. The joint potentiality of the Ganga and the Brahmaputra basins is estimated
at about 980,000 Mm 3 of annual run-off, about 75% of which are contributed in five
monsoon months, from June to October. The discharge in the Brahmaputra rises
about three months before that in the Ganga (March in case of the Brahmaputra and
June in case of the Ganga). Moreover, the minimum dry-season discharge in the
Brahmaputra is more than 0.1 million cusecs. Thus, India's proposal of linking the
Brahmaputra with the Ganga has a lot more sense than Bangladesh's proposal of
constructing storage dams, involving Nepal, which contravenes the spirit of bilat-
eral agreements and the Joint Declaration. Moreover, such linking and diversion of

Table 9.2 Comparative study on water requirement by India and Pakistan

Particulars India Bangladesh Remarks

1 Geographical area (Million Acres) 191 6.10 -

2 Total cultivable area (Million Acres) 140 4.90 -

3 Total cropped area (Million Acres) 125.30 1.30 -

4 Length of Ganga river (including
important tributaries)

6,400 km 140 km Excluding

Bhagirathi
Hooghly in
India and Gorai
in Bangladesh

780,000 km 2 5,700 km 2

5 Catchment area —

6 Cultivable area (Million Acres) 154 5 —

7 Average rainfall 51-127 cm

(20-25 )

140-254 cm
(55-100 )

-

8 Intensity of irrigation (percent of
cultivable area)

9.90 210 -

9 Population dependent on river
(million)

210 12 -

10 Population per Sq. km 2,470 500 -