Re: Pro's and Con's of Kalabagh Dam
I don't think making new provinces will change much..the existing ones barely have any power. Mianwali along with Attock was originally part of NWFP prior to 1970, if one looks closely at the map you will see that one section of Mianwali is firmly on the natural NWFP side of the border.
Re: Pro's and Con's of Kalabagh Dam
Provinces alone won't matter but with decentralization of power, it will (plus it will help break the feudal oligarchies that are entrenched over vast rural areas of Pakistan).
Take it from india how it partitioned its provinces and outlawed feudalism!
Re: Pro's and Con's of Kalabagh Dam
If the dam is located above the punjab-sindh line, then punjab has easy access to shut off water supply to sindh, or at least to minimize the water supply to sindh.
No one sees this?
Re: Pro's and Con's of Kalabagh Dam
Everyone sees it except you!!!
Re: Pro's and Con's of Kalabagh Dam
^^ Exactly, for your info all other major dams are upstream to Sindh presently its nothing new, no one can build a dam in plain areas but mountains only.
One of the reason no Dam exists on River Chenab cause of no suitability.
water distribution accord 1991 devide the water between Provinces.
PCG - India can stop most rivers coming to Pakistan but - an accord stops it doing so.
Re: Pro's and Con's of Kalabagh Dam
^ Shak you've answered the root cause of the problem in that very statement..the difference between the 1991 water accord and the indus basin treaty between Pakistan & India is huge..while there is a lot of mistrust between Pakistan & India for the most part the accord minus Baghliar has been a success because both parties acknowledge the importance of keeping their word.
In Pakistan no such belief in the rule of law exists.. the 1990 water accord having been violated countless times, and the Federal governments reputation as far as following the constitution is concerned goes without saying...deal making is far easier then following the letter of the law..especially for a military government anxious to please its core supporters.
Re: Pro's and Con's of Kalabagh Dam
Even so, hasn't India violated that accord at least once? I remember some hangama about it recently.
Re: Pro's and Con's of Kalabagh Dam
^^ India has tried it, but cause of World Bank involvment it cant build the dam on Chenab waters.
Zakk you are right about the lack of trust and Law abiding by governments, but if there is no canal derived from KBD then sure there will be no loss of water for Sindh.
to me a Technical Project has become very very political for own gain of some parties.
Technical issues can be resolved with an acceptable solution. but political gains for politics can never be resolved until a deal is done off the scene.
Major bias against the Dam is because royality will go to punjab cause dam location is in Punjab. Small provices doesnt like that at all.
*If that issue is solved and royality is shared and some favours/rewards are given to party leaders and feudals who are at presently against it * all will agree overnight! and mushi knows it. A techincal justification or design change will never be enough for our political race. They are not crying out loud for people of provinces as it seems but for own political gains and what they can personaly get out of this big project.
Re: Pro's and Con's of Kalabagh Dam
PCG: To my knowledge the only violation of the 1960 accord that has not been resolved is Baghliar
Shak: The royalty issue again is being tossed around as well..but it comes back to the core issue, NWFP was constitutionally promised royalty for tarbela ( as was Baluchistan for Sui) the record of actual payment is a joke..so again whats the point of believing a promise of royalty when the promise isn't worth the paper it's written on?
The Feudal/ Sardar issue is a much loved excuse of people bashing smaller provinces but go and do a check and list all the top feudals/sardars of Punjab, Sind, NWFP and Baluchistan ..you will invariably find that 80% of them are with Musharraf..and if one defines a feudal as someone who imposes his idea of whats right on people and doles out patronage..you have just defined Musharraf.
Re: Pro’s and Con’s of Kalabagh Dam
Excellent article about the Dam:
The next myth: That Kalabagh Dam will provide water for an additional million hectares of land for agriculture. The evidence in the reports of the National Commission on Agriculture (NCA, 1987) and the National Conservation Strategy (NCS, 1991) suggests otherwise, and appears to have been ignored. According to these reports, “the amount of cultivable land [available] is nearly matched by the amount cultivated, leaving little scope for expansion at the extensive margin.” To extend the existing 17.22 million hectares of irrigated land will require massive investment in irrigation infrastructure and demographic translocations that does not figure in cost estimates.
Myth no. 3: Extra water will enable higher intensity of cultivation in existing irrigated lands yielding enhanced productivity. In agriculture, there is a principle of diminishing returns of inputs applied because of biological constraints. We have been far over the curve of diminishing returns in water for centuries. Flood irrigation is a ‘feast and famine’ strategy that wastes 65 per cent of water applied to plants; the rest either evaporates, leaches down or suffocates plants. The marginal increase in productivity is going to be pathetically low. Simply put, we will use manifold more water to get a meagre increase of produce. This is besides the ill effects of over irrigation, which is high water tables and salinity/sodicity. Pakistan has 5.5 million hectares (almost 30 per cent of irrigated land) drowning in water – four times more in Sindh than in the Punjab. Salinity seriously affects 20 per cent of canal commanded areas in the Punjab, 29 per cent in Sindh, 23 per cent in Pakistan.
The 25-year National Drainage Plan project has been launched at a cost of 780 million dollars to mitigate these impacts of over-irrigation on one side and we are clamouring for storing more water to flood our lands. Something is not right, obviously. We are not playing along with nature but against it!
Most serious of all, we have myth no. 4: That we have ‘irrigation experts’ to advice us sagaciously on water issues. What we mistake for irrigation experts are in fact ‘hydraulic engineers’ because that is what the British left us in 1947 when irrigation had not developed into an exact science. They know how to handle water from the mountains, through rivers, dams, barrages, canals and watercourses to the field. They have little clue of what happens after that. Irrigation is a science of calculating and delivering exact amounts of water to the plants growing in the field. It is assumed that the farmer knows how to do it since the days of the Moenjodaro civilisation --applies too much when he has water and starves the crop when he does not. I have made a sweeping statement, I know. Just ask an open question: “Why do plants need water?” I would bet my white moustache if more than half a dozen persons in the country could give a comprehensive answer
Re: Pro's and Con's of Kalabagh Dam
^^ who has written this article ?? and i know there will be millions in Pakistan who can answer this question.
also look like he considers himself as irrigation expert compared to WAPDA lunatics 'hydraulic engineers'
our problem is always , everyone knows best and expert to give judgment for even a very techincal designed and analysed projects.
we should get over this concept , DAMs starve the down stream people, its not a barrage. main purpose of these dams are for power generation and water storage. it doesnt divert water to Punjab fields.
ZAK - there may be royality issues and govt havent been very regular or fair in paying. but people in NWFP and Blochistan do get cheaper electricity and as compared to everyone else in the country though it may not be enough to justify all.
by feudals/leaders I meant everyone who is position to lead some people from areas concerned about this dam.
and i am not denying the facts that small provinces do have serious concerns, but these can be discussed on the table instead of strikes and blah blah. A strike may not harm leaders of groups/parties but certainly harm a ordinary person on daily wages and country's economy.
Re: Pro's and Con's of Kalabagh Dam
It is sad state about strikes and violence that is used by political parties!
Shah the issue is that in the past (during nawaz era as chief minister of punjab) and even now Mush is hinting about canals coming out of KBD. There would be less opposition had it been a carryover dam. Maybe the so-called esteemed members of this site haven't read sindhi papers but they said in the last few years when the drought was very severe, WAPDA did take out water from lower indus (indifferent stealing) to fill iPunjab's own quota.
Musharraf may say 'lets forget the past' but lets see as majority of you are in america / europe and you know as well as me that rather is it academics, credit history, car / home loan. You all know how much your past history matters in whether you get admitted somewhere or are able to secure a loan.
Then there is the issue of constitutional guarantees. Sadly Mush for whatever good he has done can't give that either as he himself subverted the constitution (which has happened in the past and no guarantees it wouldn't happen again).
So how do we have provinces trust each other in this old relic of a rotten system of ours????
Re: Pro's and Con's of Kalabagh Dam
So lets forget the dam then :( :) and all other similar national projects. Punjab will not loose more than other provinces if it doesnt get build.
cause we cant trust eachother, we should work towards building trust first before building anything!!
Re: Pro's and Con's of Kalabagh Dam
OK! I see a few pro-dam-ers and a couple of anti-damers. Based on the arguments, there can be no consensus.
My 2 cents! Pro-damers should go ahead and build the Dam(n) thing. However KBD shouldn't be the end of this Dam(n) building. Just continue on and put the stuff in Skardu, Bhasha, or wherever you can find river flowing between two high mountains.
It is a shame that all the anti-progress nonsense is spread by the ones who have left the country and now settled in totally un-Islamic heavens such as UK and the US. Still these pitiful species don't want their motherlands to develop like their homelands. Shameful indeed!
Re: Pro's and Con's of Kalabagh Dam
antiobl, I'd love for Pakistan to develop. But I don't want to see more sindhis dying off so that Punjab can have more green lush fields. Doesn't make any sense to me.
Re: Pro's and Con's of Kalabagh Dam
Exactly. That may help parts of Punjab in the short run, but would only lead to the break up of Pakistan, sooner or later, which apart from any emotional attachment people might have to the idea of Pakistan, would be bad for Punjab as they take so much from the rest of Pakistan.
Re: Pro’s and Con’s of Kalabagh Dam
PCG, I hear you. However you can’t have it both ways. In one sentence there is a talk about development, and the very second sentence smacks of ancient tribalism.
Sindhis dying. What a statement! Is this we call “consensus building”, by using death and destruction?
How many Sindhis have died due to Pakistani Dams such as: Mangla and Turbela? How many more Sindhis are about die due to Bharati Dam in Bhagaliar?
Spreading hatred in the name of ones tribe may bring in few bucks of Federal bribes, but it can in no way lead to development and progress.
Re: Pro's and Con's of Kalabagh Dam
[quote]
How many Sindhis have died due to Pakistani Dams such as: Mangla and Turbela? How many more Sindhis are about die due to Bharati Dam in Bhagaliar?
[/quote]
^ If Pakistan decides to totally reject any dissident voices then what do you think what kind of precedent will be set for India (as Pakistan's case for water diversion is the same principle too).
Re: Pro’s and Con’s of Kalabagh Dam
Look yara! I don’t have an axe to grind with you.
My question was directed to PCG for one of her comments about Sindhi deaths. You jump in and take a detour. You guys make up your mind and prove that Sindhis have died as a result of any dam built up river either in Pakistan or Bharat. Prove by using historic flows in Sindh river and show that Sindh had no water in the summer while Frontier, Punjab, and Kashmir got all the river supply. So please either put up or …
Re: Pro's and Con's of Kalabagh Dam
It is pretty logical as the water passes thru Punjab (indus anyway) while frontier gets its water from kabul water (but that's a different issue).
ANd what do I have to prove?
Musharraf already proved (though in trying to push for the dam case) how drought was more severe in sindh (due to unlined canals but also because punjab did take out water for its own use from lower indus which is sindh's water).
The water theft incidents occurred in the chashma-jhelum link.
THe biggest issue with KBD might not be the dame but of TRUST!
THere are no constitution guarantees in Pakistan (heck it is LFO constitution with each new government).
Basically it is jis ki lathi, us ki bhens (and punjab wins more due to its role in Army and bureacracy).