Eyebrows raised over opening of spillways

Yogindra Mohan

Patiala

The action of Bhakra Beas Management Board to open the spillways of Pong Dam even when water level has not reached the upper limit of 1390 feet has raised many an eyebrows.

Insiders said that the move to open the spillway gates when the reservoir level was much lower than 1390 feet and resorting to extra release of water to bring down the level in the reservoir, that too in the middle of August, was “unprecedented” in the history of the dam.

It is pertinent to mention here that the Pong Dam reservoir is designed to hold water up to 1400 feet. Last year, the water level had even gone up to 1394 feet, whereas the upper limit has been fixed at 1390 feet this year by BBMB authorities. Surprisingly, even though the reservoir level is lower this time (than 1390 feet), the BBMB is persisting with extra spillage, apparently to create additional storage capacity.

One of the functions of the dam was to control floods, pointed out Padamjit Singh, chairman of All India Power Engineers Federation.

However, by resorting to extra spillage and depletion of dam water level, the flood-control function was defeated since extra water was released into the river, which was substantially more than the inflows. Spillage of such nature defeats all three functions of the dam, namely irrigation, power and flood control.

The BBMB had opened spillways of Pong Dam on August 14 afternoon. The spillage continues even now, although water inflow in the dam reservoir has considerably tapered down. At 00 hours on August 19, the reservoir level was 1387.83 feet, with inflows of about 56,000 cusecs and spillage of about 70,000 cusecs. Thus, the reservoir was losing at least 14,000 cusecs of water. By 6pm on Friday, even though the inflow had reduced to about 40,000 cusecs, the spillage continued to be around 69,000 cusecs, bringing down the reservoir level to 1387.46 feet.