India-Bangladesh Trans-Boundary River Management: Understanding the Tipaimukh Dam Controversy

Subject: Geography

Section: Mapping

Background:

Tipaimukh Dam is a proposed embankment dam on the river Barak in Manipur state India first commissioned in 1983.
The purpose of the dam is flood control and hydroelectric power generation.
It has been subject to repeated delays as the project developed, as there has been controversy between India and Bangladesh over water rights

Controversies related to Dam:

Experts feel the massive dam will disrupt the seasonal rhythm of the river and have an adverse effect on downstream agriculture and fisheries.
Tipaimukh area lies in an ecologically sensitive and topographically fragile It is within one of the most seismically volatile regions on the planet
The region is situated in one of the biodiversity hotspots of not only India but the world.
It is also the home of the Hmar people, part of the Kuki tribe, whose cultural identity and very lives are intertwined with the river.
2007 Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) report observed that the project will permanently submerge some 291.5 sq. km. at FRL (275.5 sq. km. in Manipur and 16 sq. km. in Mizoram).

Barak-Meghna River System

The main river rises in the Manipur Hills near LiaiKullen village of northeast India as the Barak River and flows west becoming the Surma and Kushiyara River and then flows south as the Meghna River (after the two former rivers join again near the north of Bhairab Bazar) to the Bay of Bengal.
The principal transboundary tributaries of the Barak from India are the Jiri, the Dhaleshwari (Tlawng), the Longai, the Madhura, the Sonai (Tuirial), the Rukni and the Katakhal.
- At the border with Bangladesh, 30 km west of Silchar (District Cachar, Assam, India) and near Amalshid (Bangladesh) the river divides with the northern branch called the Surma River and the southern the Kushiyara River.
- The Surma is fed by tributaries from the Meghalaya Hills to the north.
- The Kushiyara receives tributaries from the Sylhet Hills and Tripura Hills to the south, the principal one from the Tripura Hills being the Manu. When the Surma and the Kushiyara finally rejoin in Kishoreganj Districtabove Bhairab Bazar, the river is known as the Meghna River