In view of the downstream devastation that a failure of the 117-year-old Mullaperiyar Dam can cause, in January 2018, lone crusader Advocate Russel Joy got the Supreme Court to issue a directive to the governments of Kerala and Tamil Nadu, and the Union Government, to constitute immediately an action-ready disaster management team.
The unpreparedness of the team became apparent when disaster struck in the unprecedented torrential monsoon of 2018. Release of water to lower the level by just two feet, without proper warning or steps to protect people downstream, led to a horrific loss of life and property. The Central Water Commission report amazingly absolves the powers that be of wrongdoing by saying that the release of dam waters “neither added to the flood nor helped in reduction of the flood”. But independent scientific inquiries beg to differ.
That a contract was entered into for a period of 999 years—unknown even in the annals of colonial Britain’s history—over a lime and surkhi structure that was expected to last not more than fifty years, is itself an ambiguity, as Russel Joy states. The first page of the grossly partisan treaty of 1895 gives away the real reason for the British wanting the virgin territory, says Joy. It gives the British rights to 8,000 acres of equatorial virgin rainforest abounding in rosewood and teak which were shipped to grace the grand buildings of England. It also gives the British the right to all the gemstones that the region abounds in, and to its mineral wealth. Water to irrigate the rainshadow areas of Tamil Nadu is more an afterthought. To state that the British built the dam for the sake of Indian agriculture is like saying the British built the Indian Railways for Indians to have better connectivity. The railways were built just to get raw materials to Britain and to get finished products sold in India, much to the detriment of Indian economy.
Agreed, the engineer who built the Mullaperiyar dam was devoted to it; just as some of the British district collectors truly loved the land. But it seems unfair that 3.5 million citizens of free India residing in five districts of Kerala have to fear for their lives because of a grossly unfair treaty forced by colonial Britain on their ruler 125 years ago! Surely, the government of free India cannot turn a blind eye; it has a duty to protect the lives of citizens.
Many factors increase the risk of a Mullaperiyar Dam burst—global climate change that makes for erratic high precipitation monsoons; increasing landslides due to deforestation coupled with torrential monsoons; its location in a seismically active zone; the fact that the dam was built using techniques which the dam technology today considers obsolete and, at 117 years of age, the dam is worn out and, is therefore, at risk to succumb to strain with the lime leaching out and cracks developing; and two fairly recent earthquakes/tremors in the region leading to more cracks.
All these factors make decommissioning of the dam imperative; when to do it, is the only question. Claims that repairs have been done adequately are countered by others. Indian experts' opinion on the adequacy of ‘repairs’ undertaken is divided. Therefore, it makes sense to get an independent opinion from the world’s best experts on dam safety and declare its date of decommissioning depending on the safety norms it meets.
What is the bounty that Tamil Nadu stands to lose if the dam is decommissioned? If free India seeks to force colonial Britain’s 999-year treaty on Kerala and insists on a dam, a new, by far safer one, may be built and a new fair agreement worked out between the giver, Kerala and the receiver of bounty, Tamil Nadu.
The fact that 3.5 million lives are at risk of being suddenly swept away can no longer be ignored. It's high time to act.
Dr Hiramalini Seshadri is an author and a rheumatologist. Opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of THE WEEK