Rajkot

Bhadar dam which supplies drinking water to Rajkot city and other towns nearby is in discussion, not for the reason that it has been filled with water in first spell of rains itself, but for the reason that three gates of this dam don’t work and therefore huge amount of water is flowing to downstream area, and level is down.

Due to huge inflow, 26 gates of Bhadar dam were opened in 6 ft measurement last week. The rain has been on halt later. While 23 gates have been shut down completely to prevent release of water to downstream area, 3 gates have suffered damage during flood and they are not working. This has caused continuous leakage of water.

Even after employing JCB, crains and other efforts, leakage could not be solved.

Overflow and above 90% storage of water in Bhadar dam is very important development for Rajkot city, as this thing doesn’t happen every year and it rarely happens in first spell of rain in the month of June itself. If three gates are not repaired, dam will lose its previous storage of water eventually. If they are to be repaired, dam has to be empty for that. Similar problem had occurred in the past in Jamnagar district when water storage had to be sacrificed to repair the gates. But that dam was a smaller one, affecting only few villages. Bhadar is completely a different story. It’s tough call for engineers and government.

– DeshGujarat