Water inflow declines massively in both Bhakra and Pong dams in HP

With subduing rainfall, the water inflow into both the Bhakra and Pong dams on Wednesday declined massively after days of torrential rains in Himachal Pradesh that alarmingly increased the water level in them, an official said.

An official said the dams, which serve the irrigation requirements of Punjab, Haryana and Rajasthan, are still 30-40 per cent short of water and the water discharge from them has been stopped owing to prevailing flood-like situation in Punjab and Haryana.

A crucial meeting was called by the Bhakra Beas Management Board (BBMB) that saw the presence of officials of all three beneficiary states to review the discharge from both the dams, water level in rivers downstream of the dams and flooding.

"The inflow in Beas, Satluj and Ravi rivers was very high. Today, it has come down drastically. So far we have not released any water as there was no demand of water (from the beneficiary states). Already there was problem of flooding in Punjab," BBMB Secretary Satish Singla told the media after the meeting.

He earlier said that the inflow into the Bhakra dam was 2.25 lakh cusecs and in Pong it was 4 lakh cusecs.

"With the decline in rainfall intensity, the inflow has reduced. Today, it was 80,000-90,000 cusecs in Bhakra and 60,000 to 70,000 in Pong," he said.

"On the demand of Punjab not to make any discharge from the dams, we have decided not carry out any discharge for the next two-three days till the flood level recedes," he added.

The normal filling season of both the dams is mid of September.

While the Bhakra dam is built on the Sutlej river, the Pong dam is on the Beas river and the Ranjit Sagar dam on the Ravi.

Currently, the water level in the Bhakra dam's Gobind Sagar reservoir and the Pong dam reservoir stood at 1,629 feet and 1,364 feet, respectively, another official of the BBMB, which manages both the dams built on the Punjab-Himachal border, told IANS.

However, the water level in Bhakra dam is still 51 feet below the maximum capacity, while it is 26 feet less than the upper limit in Pong dam reservoir.

The Pong dam reservoir is spread over an area of 41 km with a maximum width of 19 km in Himachal Pradesh.

It came into existence after the construction of the dam on the Beas river in 1975.

The Bhakra project is a marvel in engineering.

The 225.55 metre high dam is of concrete straight gravity type having a gross storage capacity of 9,621 million cubic metre.