The reality is that CWC is supposed to be India’s premier water resources agency, and it knows and acts like one. The states have to depend on CWC for approvals of all the projects, including dam safety, policy, financial resources, besides the data. This ensures that no state has the resources or feel the necessity of gathering good quality data independent of CWC.| SANDRP
The unplanned expansion is happening at the cost of open spaces, wetlands and floodplains overwhelming the drainage systems but excess rains get portrayed as the main culprit while the real ones are conveniently overlooked. The cycle is repeated as sectorial approach deals with the intertwined hydrological factors without any coordination.| SANDRP
The Central Electricity Authority also needs to come out with assessment as to how much PSP capacity is needed across India in different time scales and communicate the same to the EAC and MoEF. The kind of pain the PSP projects are bringing across the country is something that the MoEF, CEA or EAC seems to have absolutely no clue about and a lot of that may be completely avoidable. The kind of frauds, displacements and deforestation that these projects are bringing is shocking, particularly ...| SANDRP
This seems like looking for short cuts for major interventions in high-risk, fragile, disaster-prone Himalayan region where such regions have already proved to be major force multipliers. The climate change is making the Himalayas even more prone to high-risks and disasters for multiple reasons, often compounded by multiple factors.| SANDRP
It is also observed that the Ganga River at Kachhala Bridge site in UP, Dhardha at Masaurhi in Bihar and Icchamati at Kuthibari, Bajitpur sites in W Bengal are breaching HFLs frequently and staying…| SANDRP
It is good to see that NEHR has gone a step forward and sent legal notice to WAPCOS and we hope not only NEHR takes WAPCOS to NGT/ Courts, but the judicial agency does take action to reject the EIA…| SANDRP
This is a very serious matter and suggests at a catastrophic flood event to unfold in national capital whenever HKB records more than 5 or 6 lakh cusecs the peak flood volume or repeats 1978 or 201…| SANDRP
As recent reports on SANDRP website by Parineeta Dandekar shows, the Himalayan areas are vulnerable to several kinds of disasters, made worse by climate change and mindless infrastructure developme…| SANDRP
The available media reports clearly show that several extreme weather events fuelled by WDs have struck the Northwest and Northeast Himalayan states in pre-monsoon months in 2025, killing at least …| SANDRP
The BBMB also publicly cited the need to follow the technical requirements based on rule curve while advocating water release for Haryana. This is also strange in early May when dam is at the lowes…| SANDRP
The discussion is still about source of funds and NDSA chairman has asked AP to initiate some work using AP’s own funds and get the expenses reimbursed afterwards. This is hardly confidence inspiri…| SANDRP
It reminds one of the Supreme Court remarks when the apex court said that the dam safety authorities at the Centre seemed to be in slumber, though it was in context of another project. The NDSA exp…| SANDRP
Many individual groups, experts and even the Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar has rightly demanded to make such an assessment to decide about the decommissioning of the dam. This is because there …| SANDRP
On a related subject the publication of research about greening of Thar in recent decades partly due to increased rainfall and partly due to increased groundwater use also raises question as to why…| SANDRP
Our study earlier showed that Mumbai does not need any additional dam including Gargai if it utilizes available local resources including rainfall, reuse of treated sewage, desalinization, demand s…| SANDRP
As far as wetlands protection in India is concerned, the events here have a mix of tragedy, comedy, tragicomedy, among other genres. It will be interesting to see where this sequence of events ends…| SANDRP
There is a lot one can learn from Kham River Revival as a model if we want to. The key is to first understand the problem, create a plan to address various components of the issue, going systematic…| SANDRP
The questions raised range from basic justifiability of the project, problematic decision-making process at each stage of the project violating the statutory processes, the severe long term adverse…| SANDRP
The ancIBD method paper from the David Reich Lab was just published in Nature (open access here). It's a very useful effort, but the authors are still somewhat confused about the origin of the Corded Ware culture (CWC) population. From the paper (emphasis is mine): This direct evidence that most Corded Ware ancestry must have genealogical links to people associated with Yamnaya culture spanning| Eurogenes Blog
I've started analyzing the Identity-by-Descent (IBD) data from the recent Ringbauer et al. preprint (see here). Unfortunately, it'll take me a few weeks to do this properly, so I won't be able to write anything detailed on the topic for a while. Meantime, this is the comment that I left for the authors at bioRxiv (at this time it's still being approved, but it should appear there within a day or| Eurogenes Blog
Mon bilan pour ce Cold Winter Challenge. Cette année j’ai réussi à le terminer en diversifiant mes lectures.| LET ME ENTERTAIN YOU
Even in cases like the 1500 MW Warasgaon Warangi PSP in Western Ghats Maharashtra, when the project is asked to reapply due to massive increase in forest land and when details letters are sent to E…| SANDRP
Himanshu Thakkar of SANDRP, says, “As dams age, a major concern is that they get silted up, decreasing their storage capacity. Secondly, there is wear and tear of the gates and walls. But the more …| SANDRP
This is even more relevant in inherently vulnerable areas like the Himalayas and Western Ghats from the point of view of seismic activity, young erosion prone mountain, flash floods, avalanches and…| SANDRP
However, the CGWB in its second report has claimed that total annual groundwater recharge has increased (15 billion cubic meters or BCM) substantially, and extraction has declined (3 BCM) in 2024 f…| SANDRP
This proposed, one of the largest capacity hydropower projects in the world has little merit, considering the inherent disaster potential of the biodiversity rich area, climate change induced accel…| SANDRP
The Buddha nala pollution issue is decades long, but the current movement started about six months back. It is also heartening to know that even affected people from downstream, from Rajasthan have…| SANDRP
The problems faced by people along the Duhnoi River along Assam Meghalaya border are typical of the problems faced by millions all over the country, the manifestations and their intensity may be so…| SANDRP
An interesting study reported this week reveals Big Dams are costly gambles and explains why this is so. In fact, the explanations go on to reveal that this is by design, the costs are systematical…| SANDRP
Similar to we wrote on Sept 1 2024[i], but possibly with even greater flood prospects and urgency, the situation in Narmada River Basin is once again moving towards a massive avoidable flood disast…| SANDRP
The controversial Ken-Betwa Interlinking project is undergoing several changes being proposed by central and state governments of UP and MP. Firstly, there are plans to build two new barrages at Pa…| SANDRP
Hydra has so far acted upon 166 encroachments and recovered 43.54 acres of land since its inception. The most number of encroachments – 54 – were located on the banks of the Chintal cheruvu (lake) …| SANDRP
