Genesis of crisis
The Hirakud reservoir cannot provide water for both irrigation and industries
Farmers say they are not getting enough water for irrigation. The government claims surplus water in the Hirakud dam. Why the contradiction? The answer lies in the dam's history, its reduced storage capacity and water inflow, and the changed cropping pattern in the reservoir's command area.
Dam planners in the early 1940s did not foresee these changes, while today's policy-makers remain blind to them. "It is a fight of perceptions without any objective evaluation of the dam's capacity. There are enough indicators that water in the dam is not as it is made out to be,' says Karunakar Supakar, former chief engineer of the Hirakud dam.
To begin with, the Hirakud irrigation system is one of the most inefficient irrigation systems in India.
A study, titled