Dams and the flood

As floods have swept across the country, we have seen also the whipping up of a campaign to build the Kalabagh Dam. The argument goes that the dam could help restrain the waters unleashed by rain. It, rather conveniently, ignores the fact that the construction of the reservoir would flood villages in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and add to water shortages in Sindh as flow in the Indus decreases. One other major argument was that several experts suggested that de-silting the lake at Tarbela would add as much water for irrigation purposes as a new dam at Kalabagh. Furthermore, three out of the four provinces oppose the building of the dam. Any decision to go ahead with it despite their concerns would polarise the country — something that did happen when Pervez Musharraf as president initially announced that it would be built.

In this context, the decision by President Asif Ali Zardari to go for small dams, at least until a consensus can be built on larger ones, is a step in the right direction. For starters, small dams are preferable for obvious ecological reasons as well as they displace far less people than large dams. What we need to do however is build far broader consensus on the issue. It is unfortunate that the flooding calamity has been used to try and achieve a certain end by those out to serve their narrow interests. People, notably in the Punjab, need to be provided much more information about large dams and why they are the cause of so much friction. It is not simply a matter of ‘patriotism’.

The re-ignition of the Kalabagh Dam controversy will only create more difficulties between the federating units. Of course, no one is questioning the very pressing need to increase Pakistan’s water storage capacity but there are ways other than building one massive dam. We need a discussion at the national level on dams, their pros and cons. Perhaps the experts who put these advantages before the president could be asked to deliver a presentation to a national audience so that citizens have access to all the facts and can see what perils may be posed by projects such as Kalabagh.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 21^st , 2010.