Shimla, March 4: The Congress will again pursue the ambitious project to bring water for the state capital from the Pabbar river in Rohru, which was grounded due to the involvement of large stretches of dense forest area. The augmentation of water supply to the city by lifting water from the Giri river has provided only a temporary relief and will suffice only for the next three to four years. A permanent solution could be found only by tapping the Pabbar water as it could provide 68 MLD of additional water, which would be enough to serve a population of six lakh, three times the current population, said Irrigation and Public Health Minister Vidya Stokes. Although water will have to be fetched from sources located 180 km away near Chander Nahan, the scheme is considered attractive as no pumping of water will be required. Shimla is located at 2,200 m and water will flow down by the force of gravity which will help save about Rs 50 crore spent on electricity required for pumping. However, the major problem is that the Rs 1,350-crore (2009 estimate) scheme involves construction of a 180-km double pipeline, a large portion of which will pass through the virgin forest areas and private land. Almost 65 km length starting from Narkanda, Baghi, Sungri, Moral Danda, Deodhar and other places up to Janglik will have to be laid through thick forests. It will require virtually a five-metre-wide corridor for which thousands of trees will have to be axed and another 35-km length will pass through private land. Forest clearance and acquisition of private land will be major hurdles. However, Stokes said if the state carried out compensatory afforestation, there should be no problem in securing forest clearance. Besides, the department was also working on some other proposals, which include lifting of water from the Kol Dam reservoir and tapping water from the tail race of the Luhri project. Engineer-in-Chief RK Sharma said the Kol Dam scheme would cost Rs 515 crore as water would have to be pumped up in two stages and treatment would be carried out after stage-I. In case of the Luhri scheme, the advantage was that de-silted water would be available from the tail race from a point upstream the Kol Dam reservoir. However, the project would not come up before 2022 and as such it could not be an immediate option, he added.