Sustainability measures in Indira Gandhi Canal command

Topic: Regional Planning and Sustainable Development in India · NCERT: Class 12, Ch 6 "Planning and Sustainable Development in Indian Context"

Meaning

The sustainability measures in the Indira Gandhi Canal command are seven steps proposed for the Indira Gandhi Nahar Pariyojana (IGNP) area in western Rajasthan. They aim to keep farming there going in the long run without harming the land, the water or the people. They are: strict water management, avoiding water-intensive crops, CAD works, reclaiming waterlogged and saline land, eco-development, support for poor allottees, and economic diversification. Five of the seven aim at ecological balance.

They matter because the canal greened the Thar Desert, but it also caused waterlogging and soil salinity. These measures are India's model answer to a basic question: how can a dryland be irrigated without damaging it?

Explanation

Why the measures were needed (cause → process → result)

• The soil lets water through very easily.
• Western Rajasthan has desert soils. They are not fertile and hold very little water.
• A UNDP soil study (1971-74) found that the soil could hold at most 1.13% available moisture. It had about 40% porosity (open space between sand grains) and good to very good permeability (water passes through it easily) [4].

• So canal water sinks quickly through the sand.

• Waterlogging (the water table rises into the root zone, the top soil layer where roots grow).

• Farmers use too much water, and water also seeps out of the canals.
• This water sinks until it reaches a hard layer it cannot pass through. It collects there as a perched water body (water trapped above that layer).

• The canal was filled for the first time, and soon after, surface water appeared at 127 locations along the main canal and covered 900 ha [7].

• Soil salinity (salts building up in the topsoil).

• The water table rises slowly over the years.
• The hot, dry climate makes the water near the surface evaporate quickly. The salts stay behind in the topsoil.

• CGWB links rising groundwater and heavy evaporation in semi-arid regions to salinity in canal commands [5].

• The water created was poorly used.

• In Stage-II, only 29-46% of the irrigation potential created during 1997-2002 was actually used [3].
• The reasons were:
  • pumping stations in the lift area were unfinished;
  • watercourses (small channels from the outlet to the fields) were unfinished, because the IGNP and CAD departments did not work together;
  • land was not allotted to settlers [3].

The seven measures

#	Measure	What it means on the ground
i	Strict water management	Protective irrigation in Stage-I: water is given only to save crops from drought. Extensive irrigation in Stage-II: water is spread thinly over a large area of crops and pasture
ii	No water-intensive crops	Crops that need a lot of water, such as rice, are avoided. Plantation crops such as citrus are grown instead
iii	CAD works	Watercourses are lined (given a hard, sealed surface), land is levelled, and warabandi is followed. This cuts conveyance loss (water lost on the way to the field)
iv	Reclaim waterlogged and saline land	Extra water is drained away and the land is brought back into farming
v	Eco-development	Afforestation (planting trees), shelterbelts (rows of trees that slow the wind) and pasture, especially in the fragile, sandy Stage-II area
vi	Social sustainability	Money and institutional support for poor land allottees, so they can actually farm the land given to them
vii	Economic diversification	Work beyond farming and animal husbandry, by linking basic villages, agro-service centres and market centres

• Measures i-v aim at ecological balance. Measure vi is social and measure vii is economic.
• NCERT calls eco-development the most crucial factor for sustainable development in the IGNP command.

How the measures work in practice

• Drainage (measure iv):
• Surface drains and sub-surface drains (pipes laid underground) collect the extra canal water.
• Link drains carry this water to a permanent out-fall point (the place where drained water is finally released) [2].

• Field drains remove extra water from farm plots and so prevent waterlogging [2].

• Biodrainage (measures iv and v together):

• Biodrainage means planting trees that take up a lot of water and release it into the air through their leaves (transpiration). This lowers the water table.
• About 47,210 trees were planted along the main canal at km 290-291.8. The main species were Eucalyptus camaldulensis, Acacia nilotica, Prosopis cineraria (khejri) and Dalbergia sissoo (shisham) [7].
• The flooded area fell from 25 ha (1988) to 2 ha (1993), and there was no flooding by 1994 [7].

• The groundwater level fell by about 15 m over 1991-1997. The effect reached more than 500 m beyond the edge of the plantation [7].

• Warabandi (part of measure iii):

• Warabandi shares canal water by rotation.
• Every farmer under one outlet gets water for a fixed time on a fixed day. The time each farmer gets is in proportion to the size of their landholding.

• It gives tail-end farmers (those at the far end of the canal) their fair share. It also stops over-irrigation, which feeds waterlogging.

• What the greening achieved:

• Trees and grass hold the loose sand in place, so less sand blows into the canals and they silt up more slowly.
• The soil stays moist for longer.

Where it occurs

• Source of water: the Harike barrage (Hari-ka-Pattan) in Punjab, below the meeting point of the Satluj and Beas rivers. A 204 km feeder canal carries the water to Rajasthan [4].
• Command area: western Rajasthan, in the Thar Desert.
• Bikaner district alone has an IGNP command of 5,91,000 ha: 1,79,000 ha in Stage-I and 4,12,000 ha in Stage-II [4].

• Stage-II has a culturable command area (the part of the command that can actually be farmed) of 13.16 lakh ha. Of this, 8.73 lakh ha is under flow irrigation (water reaches fields by gravity) and 4.43 lakh ha is under lift irrigation (water is pumped up to higher land) [3].

• Biodrainage site: IGNP main canal, km 290-291.8 [7].

• Central scheme support:
• CADWM (Command Area Development and Water Management) has been part of the Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana (PMKSY) – Har Khet Ko Pani since 2015-16 [6].
• Its components include field channels, field drains, enforcement of warabandi, land levelling, realigning field boundaries and suitable cropping patterns [6].
• It runs through Participatory Irrigation Management (PIM), in which farmers help run the irrigation system, for example through Pani Panchayats (farmers' water committees) [2].

• Cost norms from the Ministry of Water Resources interim guidelines (September 2015): field channels ₹35,000/ha, reclamation of waterlogged areas ₹20,000/ha and micro-irrigation ₹50,000/ha [2].

• Warabandi is used mainly in the canal commands of north-west India: Punjab, Haryana and Rajasthan.

• Similar problems in other commands: waterlogging in Punjab-Haryana, and salinity in the Tungabhadra command (Karnataka) and the Chambal command (Rajasthan-Madhya Pradesh).

Don't confuse with

• Protective irrigation vs extensive irrigation: protective irrigation (water given only to save crops from drought) is for Stage-I. Extensive irrigation (water spread over a large area of crops and pasture) is for Stage-II. MCQ options often swap them.
• Eco-development vs CAD works: both are among the seven measures, but NCERT names eco-development as the most crucial factor. CAD works (lining, levelling, warabandi) are only one of the seven.
• Waterlogging vs salinity: waterlogging is too much water in the root zone. Salinity is salt left behind when that water evaporates. In the IGNP, waterlogging usually comes first and salinity follows.
• Waterlogging in canal belts vs groundwater over-exploitation: canal belts have too much water. Away from the canal, Bikaner's stage of groundwater development (groundwater taken out as a share of groundwater available) is about 170%, so it is Over-Exploited [4]. The same district has both opposite problems.

Prelims Hooks

• There are seven sustainability measures for the IGNP command. Five aim at ecological balance, and eco-development is the most crucial factor.
• Stage-I → protective irrigation. Stage-II → extensive irrigation of crops and pasture.
• The recommended crops are plantation crops such as citrus. Water-intensive crops such as rice are to be avoided.
• Warabandi = water shared by rotation, for a fixed time on a fixed day, in proportion to landholding size.
• Crop shift after the canal: gram, bajra, jowar → wheat, cotton, groundnut, rice.
• CADWM has been part of PMKSY – Har Khet Ko Pani since 2015-16 [6]. Biodrainage on the IGNP lowered the water table by about 15 m over 1991-1997 [7].

Mains Points

• Irrigation in drylands can work against itself (GS-I/III).
• Sandy, porous soil plus too much water leads to seepage and a rising water table. Waterlogging follows, and then salinity.

• In Stage-II, only 29-46% of the irrigation potential was used during 1997-2002. This shows weak coordination between the canal and CAD departments [3].

• A single fix does not work. The answer has to combine three kinds of measures:

• ecological: afforestation, shelterbelts, pasture and biodrainage;
• engineering: lined watercourses, surface and sub-surface drains and land levelling;
• institutional: warabandi, PIM and Pani Panchayats [2][7].

• Support for poor allottees and links between villages, agro-service centres and market centres spread income beyond farming. This lowers the pressure on fragile land.

• Lessons for other commands (GS-III):

• Punjab-Haryana, Tungabhadra and Chambal face the same problems.
• They can use drip and sprinkler irrigation, crop planning and sub-surface drainage.
• Canal water and groundwater must be managed together, because canal belts are waterlogged while nearby areas are over-exploited. In Bikaner, CGWB proposes micro-irrigation over 3,408 sq km and a change of crops on 2,257 ha [4][5].

Related concepts

• Impact of Indira Gandhi Canal
• Warabandi

Read more

• Impacts of the Indira Gandhi Canal and measures for sustainable development