After 67-year wait, Athikadavu-Avinashi project in Tamil Nadu to be commissioned on August 17
The Hindu
The Athikadavu-Avinashi project in Tamil Nadu, which was conceived 67 years ago, is finally taking shape with Chief Minister M.K. Stalin set to commission the project through video conferencing on Saturday (August 17, 2024).
The Athikadavu-Avinashi project in Tamil Nadu, which was conceived 67 years ago, is finally taking shape with Chief Minister M.K. Stalin set to commission the scheme through video conferencing on Saturday (August 17, 2024).
The project proposes to divert 1.5 thousand million cubic feet (TMC) of surplus water from the downstream of Kalingarayan anicut of the Bhavani river at Kalingarayanpalayam in Erode district, filling 1,045 water bodies and irrigating 24,468 acres of farm land in Erode, Tiruppur, and Coimbatore districts.
The Bhavani river originates from the Nilgiris in the Western Ghats, enters Kerala, and re-enters Athikadavu, a place near Pilloor dam in Mettupalayam in Coimbatore district. The river enters the Bhavanisagar dam in Erode district, from where it travels 75 km to join the Cauvery river at Bhavani.
The 217-km-long perennial river is fed by both southwest and northeast monsoons, and to utilise the surplus water that enters Cauvery, farmers made a representation to the then Chief Minister K. Kamaraj in 1957 to divert the water through open canals and fill the dry pockets in the erstwhile Coimbatore district.
The scheme was initially named the Upper Bhavani Project.
Over the last 50 years, steps were taken by various State governments to get the scheme up and running. In 2009, a technical expert committee was constituted under the chairmanship of A. Mohanakrishnan, Advisor to Government of Water Resources, that investigated the viability of the scheme. It submitted a report which stated that 2 tmc ft of water during flood flow could be diverted.
Political parties, farmers, traders, welfare organisations, and the public resorted to various protests over these years urging successive governments to implement the scheme.
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