COMMAND
AREA DEVELOPMENT CHAMBAL,
INTRODUCTION
After
independence the Government of India launched a country wide programme of multipurpose river valley projects to make use
of the unharnessed water resources in the country.
The Chambal irrigation project is one of the
multipurpose river valley projects taken during the first five year plan of the
country. It was estimated that about 34 lac acre feet
water of Chambal was flowing annually without any use
for irrigation and power purposes and also washing away fertile soil through
flooding.
To
make use of this unharnessed water of Chambal, the Government of Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan
started a joint integrated scheme of three dams and a reservoir and the net
work of canals in 1953 for irrigation. The purpose of the scheme was to
generate hydro-electric power and to supply water for irrigation. The project
construction began in the year 1953 and water for irrigation by canals was made
available in 1960, although the construction of stage-III was completed in
1971. The main features of the system are :-
Stage-I
A) Gandhi Sagar Dam :-
The
river bed has a drop of 625 m. from its origin at Mhow
upto
The
storage available at Gandhi Sagar has been planned to
irrigate 4.45 Lac hectare (1.1 million acres)
annually. The head of 47 m. helps in running five generator
four of 23 MW and one of 27 KW capacity.
B)
In
the cascade development of
This
is an earthen dam with masonary structure on left
bank. The maximum hight of barrage is 37.34 m. with
F.R.L. 260.30 m.
(854.00 Ft.)
The
Kota Barrage was completed in Nov. 1960.
Stage -II:
Rana Pratap Sagar Dam :-
This
is a 54 m. high masonary dam at Rawat
Bhata in Chittorgarh
District of Rajasthan situated about 56 Kms. down
stream of Gandhi Sagar and 48 Kms.
upstream of Kota Barrage. The live storage capacity of this reservoir is 1568
MCM (1.27 MAF) while the gross storage is 2900 MCM (2.35 MAF) corresponding to
F.R.L. 353 m. This storage supplements the irrigation water available from
Gandhi Sagar, thus raising the total irrigation
potential from 445000 hectares to 567000 hect.
The
Rana Pratap Sagar power Station is located on the left bank at the toe
of the dam. The power system consists of four turbo generators of 43 MW each,
1280 Kms. of H.T. lines, 10 new grid Sub stations and
augmentation of 3 substations in Rajasthan.
Stage -III :
Jawahar Sagar Dam :-
Jawahar Sagar Dam is a 45 m. high
cement concrete gravity dam is located at a distance of 29 Kms.
upstream of Kota Barrage to utilise the fall in the
river bed for power generation. Three units each of 33 MW capacity
have been installed at this power station.
Canal System
There
are two main canals taking off from the Kota Barrage. The Right Main Canal
(RMC) is the 372 Kms. long (124 Km. in Rajasthan and
the rest in Madhya Pradesh) while the Left Main Canal (LMC) is 2.74 Km. Two
branches, Bundi branch canal and Kapren
Branch canal take off from LMC. The water carrying capacity of the RMC is 6656
cusecs. Left main canal is designed to carry water at the rate of 1500 cusecs.
Details
of canal system & Drainage system are as under :-
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
S. Canal
Systems Length
Km. Designed Culturable
No. head dis- command
charge in area
CCA
cubic ft. in hect.
per second areas
(cusecs)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1 2 3 4 5
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1.
system in Rajas- 124
Km. bra- cusecs
ha. for
than (lies in
&
Baran districts distribution & Raj.
of Rajasthan) system
1376 State
Km.
2.
system (lies in 2.59 Km. bra- cusecs hac.
distribution
system 1248
Km.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total In
Rajasthan 2750.74 Km. 8156 cusecs 2,29,000 hac.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Drainage System 1,67,000Hact.
General :-
The
Command Area of Chambal is located in
Topography :-
It
lies at an altitude between 170 M. to 260 M. above the M.S.L. (Mean sea level)
along the right and left bank of the Chambal river. The irrigable area of the project is an elongated basin
in the former alluvial plain of Chambal.
The
Command has an average land slope of about 0.08%. It is drained by 4
major rivers viz
Mej, Kalisindh, Parwan and Parvati which have cut
deep into the alluvium exposing bed-rocks at some places. The rivers are free flowing and have adequate conveyance
channels. These
channels and the net work
of meandering gullies (Nallahs) which are
tributaries to them form the primary drainage system of the area. The nallahs, in the pre-irrigation period remained dry for the
greater part of the year and drained the surface water with only occasional
flooding during the rainy season.
Climate :-
The
project has got a sub-tropical climate with moderate to hot temperature, ranges
between 7 Degree C to 45 Degree C and relative humidity drops to about 20 %
during March, April and May. July-August is most humid period averaging 70% to
80% humidity. The Kharif-wet season is spread over
from July to September. Rabi winter season is between the month
of October to February while the hot season or pre-monsoon season is occurring
from April to May. The monsoon usually starts from second half of the June but
heavy rainfall occurs during July - August and early September. The average
rainfall of the area is 850 mm.
Soils of Chambal Command Area :-
The
soils of Chambal Command Area are alluvial in nature
and fairly deep in valley portions. However, the depth varies from place to
place depending upon the extent of weathering, natural slope, drainage, extent of erosion and exposure of rock out crops.
In total tentatively 9 soils series have been identified out of which mostly
six exist in
1.
Kota & Baran Series :-
The
soils under this series occurs on flat to gently
sloping lands. The slope generally ranges from 0 to 2%. These are dominantly
fine texured varying from clay-loam to clavey. But mostly clay loam. These are non calcareous to
slightly calcareous.
2.
These
soils are similar to
3. Chambal Series :-
Chambal series soils are high in clay contents as compared
to
Chambal variant series :-
Chambal variant series soils in general are similar to Chambal series except these are mostly free from lime
contents.
Sultanpur Series :-
These
soils also falls in the category of line texured
soils and are dominantly silty-clay-loam. These are
yellowish to yellowish brown in colour and high to
very high in lime contents, which varies from 10 to 40% or more. The lime
nodules are inter-mixed throughout the soil profile.
Bundi Series :-
The
soils of this series are sandy-clay-loam to sandy-clay. The colour
ranges from dark yellowish brown to very dark brown. These soils are deep to
very deep and generally non-calcarious (in some
pockets).
Balapur Series :-
The
soils under this series are sandy-clay-loam to clay loam. The colour ranges from dak reddish
brown to very dark reddish brown. These soils are generally deep but close to
hillocks or foothills.
Guda Series :-
Guda Series falls under medium texured
soils and texure ranges from sandy-loam to fine
sandy-loam through out the soil profile. These are deep,calcarious and highly drained soils and are found
near the foothills and natural nallas and rivers.
Alod Series :-
The
soils of this series are loam to silty-loam, pale
brown to dark yellowish, deep to very deep non-calcarious to slightly calcarious.
These soils are also slowly to moderately slow permeable, slightly to moderately erodible and require
antierosion measures as given under Guda series.
CONSTITUTION OF AUTHORITY :-
With
a view to have a better coordination amongst the various functionaries of the project,
Government of Rajasthan constituted a Command Area Authority under the
Chairmanship of Area Development Commissioner,CAD,Chambal,
OBJECTIVES :-
The
main objective of the CAD programme are summarised as under :-
I. The
efficient utilisation of water implying-
i) Minimisation of water losses through lining
of canals, increasing of canal capacity, installation of control structures,
the teaching of improved techniques for more efficient water use etc.
ii) The maximisation
of gains from water use through on Farm Development works, the construction
of an improved and wider road network, improved agricultural techniques brought
about by adaptive research and agriculture extension etc.
II. The
equitable distribution of water through Warabandi
and greater control over canal system as a whole.