Maharashtra's Kalu dam lies on bed of faults

Seismologists and geologists have expressed shock at the selection of the spot for building a dam across the river Kalu in Murbad, Thane.

“I am shocked,” says Dr V Subramanyan Iyer, a retired geologist from IIT Bombay, adding that before deciding to build a dam, a detailed study of faults at the site should be undertaken.

Dr Iyer has geologically mapped the entire Kalu river belt in the past and found that it is controlled by a large number of geological faults almost all along its course. “I had detected 10 such faults between Kolthan and Amberji and four of them had been confirmed by gravitational, GPS and seismic surveys. The occurrence of a fault below a dam is undesirable and the ones in the Kalu river basin are likely to be ‘active’ faults, capable of generating earthquakes,” he says.

On June 5, DNA had carried a report on how the dam, if built, would submerge an area of 2,100 hectares, including about 1,000 hectares of dense forests and displace four villages.

The Shramik Mukti Sangathana has initiated legal proceedings against Maharashtra chief secretary Ratnakar Gaikwad, environment minister Jairam Ramesh, and Maharashtra environment secretary Valsa Nair Singh for starting work on the dam without proper permission.

Built by the Konkan Irrigation Development Corporation (KIDC) and funded by the MMRDA, the dam is in an area that the state’s revenue department calls, “an eco-sensitive area of the Western Ghats region in the Tribal Sub Plan (TSP) area of Murbad”.

Work on the dam, which has a storage capacity of 407.99 million cubic metres, has started without any environmental clearance.

While officials at the KIDC were silent following DNA’s expose; on Sunday, sources within the body admit that the fears expressed at the drawing board stage were brushed aside. “The powerful lobby pushing for the dam was able to prevail on the higher-ups. We were told that getting the dam ready for slaking Mumbai’s thirst was top priority.”

Indavi Tupule of Shramik Mukti Sangathana an organisation spearheading the fight for tribal rights in the region said she was not surprised at the blasé attitude of the authorities. “They don’t want to seek an environmental clearance, they do not want an Environment Impact Analysis and there have been no public hearings involving the local tribals who will be impacted maximum as stakeholders in any development in the region,” she said.