Does India need to relook the Dam Safety Act?

Subject :Geography

Section: Physical geography

Context:

A glacial lake outburst flood (GLOF) in North Sikkim’s South Lhonak Lake washed away one of the biggest hydropower projects in India, the Teesta III dam at Chungthang.

Dam Safety Act:

A new Dam Safety Act (DSA) was passed in late 2021, in response to deficient surveillance and maintenance causing dam failure-related disasters.
The Act provides for the surveillance, inspection, operation, and maintenance of all specified dams across the country.
India has almost 6,000 large dams and about 80% of them are more than 25 years old and carry safety risks.
These are dams with height more than 15 metres, or height between 10 m -15 m with certain design and structural conditions.

Provisions of the Dam Safety Act:

The Act listed key responsibilities and mandated that national and State-level bodies be established for implementation.
A National Committee on Dam Safety would oversee dam safety policies and regulations;
A National Dam Safety Authority would be charged with implementation and resolving State-level disputes;
The Chairman of the Central Water Commission (CWC) would head dam safety protocols at the national level;
A State Committee on Dam Safety (SCDS) and State Dam Safety Organisation (SDSO) would be set up.
- Sikkim formed an SCDS on August 17 with nine members and experts in hydrology and dam design.

State’s responsibility:

Provisions require States to classify dams based on hazard risk, conduct regular inspections, create emergency action plans, institute emergency flood warning systems, and undertake safety reviews and period risk assessment studies.
Hazard profiling and regular assessment are also mandated by the Act.
States were asked to report and record incidents of dam failures.
Until now, no statutory provision required systemic reporting of failures and no single agency was tasked with tracking this data.
The CWC keeps a record but the list is not updated regularly.

Is any action taken for failing to comply?

Failure to comply is punishable with imprisonment and/or fines, and “if such obstruction or refusal to comply with directions results in loss of lives or imminent danger thereof, [entity] shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term which may extend to two years.

What are the challenges?

DSA does not promote risk-based decision-making and fails to incentivise transparency.
periodic reviews are often not conducted or if they are, their findings are not not easily available in the public domain.
The Act requires dam builders to conduct comprehensive dam safety evaluations, but there is no standardization of how the failure is analyzed and reported.

How is dam safety undertaken?

Dam safety is a function of many parts: designing and constructing dams that adhere to safety margins, maintaining and operating them per guidelines, recording data in real-time in an accessible format, forecasting hazardous events and instituting emergency plans.
Periodic reviews are expected to bring forth fresh inundation maps and new rule curves (which determine the capacity of dam reservoirs), all of which contribute towards the safety of the downstream areas.

Important facts:

Tehri Dam in Uttarakhand is the highest dam in India built on Bhagirathi River.
Hirakud Dam in Odisha built on river Mahanadi is the longest dam of India.
Kallanai Dam in Tamil Nadu is the oldest dam of India. It is built on the Kaveri river and is about 2000 years old.

Source: TH