Authorities blamed for Orissa's 'man-made' floods

Authorities in Orissa must probe allegations that the worst floods experienced by the region in three decades were man-made and caused by mismanagement of water levels in a major dam, activists and experts said on Wednesday.

The floods which hit about 5.6 million people in the impoverished state were sparked by heavy monsoon rains last month, killing 83 people, submerging over 3,000 villages and leaving hundreds of thousands of people displaced with little food and water.

But experts say the devastation caused by the disaster, estimated to cost more than $6 million, could have been minimised if local authorities had not deliberately kept high volumes of water in a nearby dam, which they were then forced to release suddenly during heavy rains in September.

"It was a man-made calamity," said Ranjan Panda, convenor of Water Initiatives Orissa, a network of civil society groups which focuses on water-related issues in the coastal state.

"The reservoir levels were kept deliberately very high from the beginning," said Panda, adding that 49 of 64 sluice gates of the reservoir were opened within a time span of 48 hours.

India experiences monsoon rains from June to September, which are vital for its agriculture. But the rains frequently affect millions of people, devastating crops, destroying homes, and sparking outbreaks of diseases like diarrhoea.

Dam mismanagement The Hirakud reservoir was built across Orissa's Mahanadi river in the 1950's, primarily for flood control. But over the years the dam has been used for irrigation, power generation and also provision of water for industries, leading to vast volumes of water being stored in the reservoir.

Experts say that, as a result, the dam authorities poorly regulated the water levels, releasing huge volumes into already burgeoning rivers over a short period, causing rivers to overflow and inundate low-lying villages and farmland.

For days, thousands of poor villagers were stranded on rooftops, waiting for rescue workers to take them by boats to higher ground, while government helicopters air-dropped dry food rations to the marooned. Many still remain in relief camps.

But government officials dispute the allegations, saying that water levels in the Hirakud dam need to be maintained to a certain level as it is a "multi-purpose" dam.

"Floods can be controlled only when more dams are built downstream," said Suresh Chandra Mohapatra, secretary for Orissa's water resources department.

"Industries use only 2 per cent of the reservoir capacity while 30 per cent is being used for irrigation. The water should have been kept at 68 to 88 per cent ... but we kept it only at 77 per cent."

But members of opposition parties, activists and experts in Orissa have called on the governor of the state to set up a probe to investigate mismanagement by local officials.

"Each time when a flood happens, the officials talk about more dams to contain floods," said Professor Rajkishor Meher of the government-run Nabakrushna Choudhury Centre for Development Studies in Orissa. "Hirakud has already made Mahanadi a river of sorrows and more dams will make this woe permanent."