1.1 Irrigation projects and wildlife conservation issues in India

India is predominantly an agrarian country faced with a relentless growth in its population that continues to impose increasing demands for enhancement of crop productivity on marginalized and impoverished land area under agriculture. The critical need for providing irrigation inputs for improving agriculture productivity has led to the commissioning of several minor and major irrigation projects of varying capacities in the country. As a result of past initiatives of harnessing water for irrigation, the area under irrigation in India has trebled in the last 40 years and stands at 70 million ha. By the year 2010, the country is aiming to bring an additional area of 113 million ha under irrigation. This envisages the construction of over 1000 dams (MoWR, 2000).

While these projects do bring about positive changes, in agricultural productivity and economic well being, these projects also result in undesirable transformation of natural habitats and degrade environmental quality. Irrigation and drainage projects invariably result in far reaching environmental consequences that pose major challenges for ecological, environmental and economic sustainability issues linked to such Projects. The need for striking a balance between the requirements of irrigated agriculture and environmental protection and management provide a rationale for encouraging environmental appraisal and economic evaluation of irrigation projects (Goel, 2000a).

Documented information on evaluation of river valley projects provide an understanding of the complex and diverse environmental issues associated with major irrigation projects (Afroz & Singh, 1987; Varshney, 1984; Pandey, 1993; ERL, 1993; WII, 1994; World Bank, 1994; Dougherty & Hall, 1995; Indiresan, 2000; Goel, 2000b; Goel & Aggarwal, 2000). From our understanding of the environmental issues associated with dams, the key impacts of the dams can be categorised the following:

Environmental

• Depletion of soil nutrients.
   

• Polluted incoming irrigation waters from farmlands.
   

• Introduction or increase in incidence of water borne or water related disease.
   

• Deterioration of water quality below irrigation projects through agrochemical inputs.
   

• Contamination of ground water.
   

Socio-economic

• Social conflicts of local population with new settlers due to increasing wealth differentials, conflicting traditional beliefs and cultural treats.
   

• Significant resettlement impacts for both the settler population and the host population.
   

• Loss of traditional products and practices.

Ecological

• Loss of sensitive and valued ecosystems.
   

• Loss of biodiversity, wildlife habitats and increased species rarity.
   

• Loss of regulatory functions of natural ecosystem such as soil stability, watershed hydrology regulation and protection against floods.
   

• Loss of land surface area to drainage and irrigation structure.
   

• Increased soil erosion through excessive spoil and or exposed soil surfaces.
   

• Increased stream sedimentation and damage to aquatic ecosystems.
   

• Reduction of downstream flows affecting floodplain and watershed hydrology, ecology, land use and riverine habitat.
   

• Creation of possible barriers for wide ranging terrestrial mammals.

This overview of impacts amply justifies the need for environmental evaluation of all irrigation projects for optimizing the economic benefits and minimizing the adverse impacts for sustained benefits.

1.2 The Human River Project
1.2.1 Project setting
The agricultural production in the Chandrapur district is severely constrained due to the vagaries of monsoon and recurrent drought. Recognizing the critical need of irrigation in drought affected areas for sustained agriculture yield and drinking water for the city of Chandrapur, the irrigation authorities, proposed a few projects like the Kathani, Bhiwkund and the Human irrigation Projects in the past. While the first two Projects have been rejected under the Forest Conservation Act of 1980, the Human Project remains the last possible option to overcome the water deficit of the district.

The Human River Project, at present is the only proposed irrigation Project for the Chandrapur district. The Human river represents a drainage system of the Wainganga and Wardha rivers, which later on joins the Godavari river. The Project comprises of a storage reservoir built across the Human river near the village Sirkada in the Sindewahi tehsil of Chandrapur district (Figure 1), with an estimated irrigation potential of ca. 46118 ha. The western boundary of the Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve is at a distance of 3.2 km from the periphery of the reservoir. The proposed dam (Rolled Filled Earthen Dam) will be a composite structure of 3172 m long with a maximum height of 27 m, at the deepest section, including a gated spillway having 10 gates each. The Full Reservoir Level (FRL) is fixed at RL 217.70 m and consists of two head regulators on both flanks of the dam; the Left Bank Canal (LBC) and the Right Bank Canal (RBC). The other significant features of the Project are outlined in Box1.

Box 1. Salient features of the proposed Human River Project.

 The Human Project is envisaged to benefit 160 villages (129939 individuals) in the command area of Chandrapur district and supply 34.2 mm3 of water to the city of Chandrapur. The anticipated benefits of the Project are presented in Table 1.

Table 1. Benefits of the proposed Human River Project.

Source: Anon., 2001 & 2002.

Figure 1

1.2.2 The ecological profile
The Human River Project is located in the state of Maharashtra and falls under 06D: Deccan Peninsular (Central Plateau) Province as per the biogeographic classification of India (Rodgers et al., 2002). The proposed dam site is located ca. 56 km from the origin of the Human river, a tributary of the Andhari river. As per the vegetation classification (Champion & Seth, 1968), the area represents Southern Tropical Dry Deciduous Forests with Tectona grandis (teak) as the dominant tree species. Other plant species recorded from the area include, bamboo, Pterocarpus marsupium (bija), Anogeisus latifolia (dhaoda), Adina cordifolia (haldu), Madhuca latifolia (mahua), Bombax ceiba (semal) and Diospyrous melanoxylon (tendu). The riverine forests are dominated by Mangifera indica (mango), Terminalia arjuna (arjun) and Syzygium cumini (jamun). The soil is moderately fine textured, slightly coarse and permeable.

The length of the proposed earthen dam across the Human river is 3.2 km, traversing largely through Protected Forests (Indian Forest Act, 1927) outside the boundaries of Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve. The existing land use pattern in the catchment area (within a 10 km radius) of the proposed dam is agriculture: 49.90%, forest: 37.28%, wasteland: 9.80%, mining: 0.23%, water bodies and rivers: 2.58% and built-up areas (major towns): 0.21%. The total land required under the proposed Project is ca. 7651.40 ha. This includes ca. 6173.00 ha of area under submergence, and ca. 1478.40 ha required under other components of the Project and associated infrastructural developments (Table 2).

Table 2. Land area requirements for the proposed Human River Project.

Source: Anon., 2001 & 2002.

The total amount of forest land required by the Project is ca. 1925.55 ha of which 1535.85 ha would come under submergence and 271.24 ha under canals including both the left and right bank canals. The forests under the proposed Project vary in their legal status. The area proposed for clear felling is ca. 763.54 ha, and is largely confined to the areas under the proposed submergence and the canal section through the forest (Table 3).

Table 3. Legal status of forest to be acquired under the Project and the area proposed for felling for Project related construction works.

Source: Anon., 2001 & 2002.

1.2.3 The demographic profile
The landscape of the proposed Project is dotted with villages. The Project is likely to affect a total of 39 villages, of which 15 villages will be fully submerged, 8 villages will be partly submerged, and only agriculture areas will be submerged in 16 villages. In totality, the Project is likely to affect a population of over 15410 individuals (Table 4), of which ca. 13150 individuals are likely to be displaced. All affected villages fall under the Sindewahi and Chimur tehsils of Chandrapur district.

Table 4. Demography of the villages affected by the proposed Human River Project.

Category A: Fully submerged villages; Category B: Partially submerged villages; Category C: Only land submerged villages.
Source: Anon., 2001 & 2002.

1.2.4 Environmental concerns

The area proposed for the dam construction, is a landscape dominated by agriculture and forest lands of varying legal status (Table 2). The implications of submergence and clear felling of forest land, valued as a corridor for animal movement between the Chandrapur Forest Division and the Bramhapuri Forest Division, is of primary concern for the long-term wildlife conservation in this landscape. These concerns are primarily related to the following anticipated direct impacts:
 

• The threats to the Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve (TATR) due to its proximity to the Project area.
   

• The likely degradation and the reduction of the habitat falling within the Project area due to the diversion of forest land.
   

• The probable obstruction to existing movement of wild animals between the TATR and the Chandrapur and Bramhapuri Forest Divisions.
   

1.2.5 Environmental appraisal of the Human project

Background

The Human River Project was initially proposed for implementation by the Maharashtra State in 1982-83. Over the years, the Project has been reviewed by several State and Central agencies and has been accorded clearances by Central Water Commission, Hydrology & Irrigation Planning Directorates, Archaeological Survey of India, GOI, Maharashtra Pollution Control Board after due considerations of the impacts on ground water recharge, pollution thresholds on health of local communities, resettlement rights of the villages and other related issues. After the enactment of the Forest (Conservation) Act, 1980 and subsequent amendment in the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986, vide a notification, referred to as the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) notification in 1994, EIA became a statutory requirement for environmental clearance of developments in all major sectors including the river valley projects. In response to this, the technical and financial proposal for forestry and environment clearance of Human River Project was mooted in 1998 for seeking environmental clearance from MoE&F. The Project was discussed in several meetings of the Forest Advisory Committee (FAC) between 1998 and 2001. The major recommendation of the FAC was emphasized on design modification for reduction in the height of the dam to reduce requirement of the forest area under the Project. The FAC also recommended that Project authorities should phase out the different activities so that the forestry clearance can also be granted in a phased manner to stagger the clear felling of trees. Accordingly, the Project authorities submitted the revised Project plan with necessary modifications in the dam height and canal alignment and provided the breakup of the proposed activities in the different phases of Project construction.

The environmental clearance was granted by MoE&F to the Project vide letter No. J-12011/67/2001 dated June 25th 2002 subject to the following conditions (Annexure I):

• Submission of the map of the area in context of the location of wild animal movement corridors upstream and downstream of the proposed dam.
   

• Commitment of the Project authorities to transfer management of the land to Maharashtra Forest Department after rehabilitation of the villages falling under the proposed submergence.
  Obtain forest clearance.
   

• Ensure ground water monitoring.
   

• Ensure setting up of a multidisciplinary Environmental Monitoring Cell.

The Project authorities reported compliance to the above conditions imposed by MoE&F (Annexure II) vide letter No. 99/TS1/(2) Human 34/2002 dated August 26th 2002.
In view of the Project location in close proximity to Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve, the Project was subsequently referred to Director, Project Tiger before according the forest clearance under FCA.

Scope of work for Wildlife Institute of India (WII)
Considering the importance of environmental appraisal of this Project in the light of likely impacts on Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve, it was felt that an assessment of wildlife use in the Project area was needed before according forest clearance. Based on the MoE&F directives communicated vide Director, Project Tiger letter No. 8-27/98FC(PT) dated 27/11/2002 (Annexure III), the following scope of work was decided by Wildlife Institute of India (WII):

• Rapid assessment of the habitat available and wildlife use in the proposed Human River Project area with special reference to the Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve.
   

• Identification of the likely impacts on wildlife values and wild animal movement.
   

• Recommend suitable measures for mitigation of the Project impacts.