Saurashtra: SAUNI Brings Back Villagers, But Sustainability Unsure

Experts say that lift-irrigation schemes like the SAUNI Yojana have failed the world over.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the AJI-3 dam site, a part of the SAUNI Yojana, in Jamnagar, Gujarat. (Photo: IANS)

The ambitious Rs 12,000 crore ($1.8 billion) Saurashtra Narmada Avataran for Irrigation (SAUNI) Yojana aimed at bringing water of the Narmada to Gujarat’s parched Saurashtra region is helping reunite families.

Thousands of men from the region, who had to leave home in search of livelihood owing to crop failure, are now returning with the irrigation project bringing water to their lands.

Experts, however, say that such lift-irrigation schemes have failed the world over.

But villagers are joyous right now. Mukesh Patel, 44, a resident of Thariyali village in Rajkot district, said he had returned to his village after 18 years as there was finally ample water to irrigate his land.

The government has now made arrangements to provide water to us for irrigating crops.

Mukesh Patel, Farmer 

PM Modi addresses a public gathering at the launch of the SAUNI Yojana. (Photo: IANS)

The SAUNI Yojana is aimed at filling up the 115 dams in the region with the run-off from the Sardar Sarovar dam built across the Narmada. The dams will be fed through a network of pipelines and water will be supplied for drinking and irrigation.

Patel said that water had alway been scarce in his village. “Forget irrigation, there was not enough water to drink,” he said. He added that the crop yields had also been very low owing to complete dependence on the monsoon.

Patel was among the many people from the region who took up jobs in Surat’s diamond polishing industry. “There were at least 5,000 people from my village and neighbouring areas working as diamond polishers. Now, nearly 95% of them have come back,” he said.

Rakesh Murji Patel, a resident of Khudiyali village, around 40km from Rajkot, said he and other diamond sector workers had faced hardships as remunerations were meagre. “We had no choice but to take up these jobs as there were no irrigation facilities in our villages. It is a blessing that we have now been able to return home,” he said.

Ajit Chabariya, a resident of Latipur village, said that they can now grow two crops a year due to the assured water supply. Earlier, they would grow crops only during the kharif season (July-December) and the yields were also uncertain.

Earlier, villagers mostly grew cotton during the kharif season. But now, they will also be able to grow oilseeds, sugarcane or wheat during the rabi season (January-April). With the promise of permanent water supply, we can grow two crops every year.

Ajit Chabariya, Farmer

Gujarat CM Vijay Rupani and Deputy CM Nitin Patel seen with PM Modi at the launch of the SAUNI project. (Photo: IANS)

Villagers also said that earlier, they had to dig deep to obtain drinking water and that, too, was often saline.

AD Kanani, a Superintending Engineer in the state irrigation department, said villagers will get water through pipelines and the problem of salinity would now end.

The SAUNI project will provide water to over 900 villages in all the 11 districts of the Saurashtra region and is slated to be completed by 2019.

However, experts feel that pumping water to the parched region is going to be an uphill task. “The project is based on the wrong assumption of continuos water availability in the Sardar Sarovar dam,” Himanshu Thakkar, Coordinator of the South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers and People, told IANS.

The Sardar Sarovar dam can store about 28 million acre feet of water in its reservoir. ?But out of this, Gujarat has been allocated only 9 million acre feet by the tribunal (that decided on the issue). No one can guarantee how much water the dam will get, as this will depend upon the rainfall.

Himanshu Thakkar, Coordinator, South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers and People 

Narendra Modi at the dam site in Jamnagar. (Photo: IANS)

He also said that “massive lift-irrigation schemes across the world have not been a success in the long term. I don’t think SAUNI is going to be successful either”,

Citing the example of the Sardar Sarovar Dam project, Thakkar said, “The initiative, which was intended for the Saurashtra, Kutch and north Gujarat, has not fulfilled the aspirations of residents. That’s because the canal infrastructure for carrying water to those areas wasn’t completed.”

“The water meant for these drought-prone regions was instead sent to central Gujarat,” he said. “SAUNI will meet a similar outcome.”

Highlighting the shortcomings of the project, Thakkar said,

The command area of the SAUNI Yojana is not satisfactory as it will send water only to 1.1 million hectares of land once completed, while over 4.2 million hectares are needed water for irrigation.

He also slammed the Gujarat government for not harvesting rainwater. “Water levels are falling in most parts of Saurashtra, Kutch and north Gujarat. That’s because unsustainable methods are being employed and rainwater is not being harvested.”

“In 2015, there were heavy floods in the Saurashtra region. If water-harvesting schemes and check dams had been in place, the groundwater could have been recharged,” he added.

(Published in an arrangement with IANS)