Chandigarh, March 12: While presenting the State Budget for the year 2021-22 during the budget session of Haryana Vidhan Sabha here today, the Chief Minister, who also holds the portfolio of Finance Minister, announced an enormous amount of Rs. 8,483 crores for the Budget Estimate of 2021-22, of which Rs. 5,081 crores for irrigation and Rs. 3,402 crores for public health and engineering. The outlay of Rs. 8,483 crores for BE 2021-22, which is 37.2 percent increase over RE 2020-21 of Rs. 6,183 crores.
The Chief Minister, Sh. Manohar Lal said that Conservation and economic use of water is the Government’s top most priority and realizing the same in next two years will be dedicated as “WATER BIENNIAL 2021-23” to bring focus on conservation, management, reuse, recharge and recycling of water.
While reiterating Government's commitment to make a sincere and concerted effort to construct the Satluj-Yamuna Link Canal to provide a fair share of Haryana from the waters of the Ravi-Beas rivers, the Chief Minister announced to allocate an outlay of Rs 100 crore in the year 2021-22. If there is any additional demand for funds for this purpose, the Government is committed to provide them, he said.
“We have made a number of institutional and structural changes such as establishment of ‘The Haryana Water Resources (Conservation, Regulation and Management) Authority’ in order to achieve a sustainable water resources regime to take a holistic overview of ground and surface water for judicious, equitable and efficient use,” said the Chief Minister.
Micro Irrigation and Command Area Development Authority constituted
The Chief Minister said that the State has also strengthened the existing Command Area Development Authority and renamed it as Micro Irrigation and Command Area Development Authority to promote and implement micro irrigation in addition to regular command area development programme for increasing agricultural production and productivity and farmer incomes in Haryana while conserving scarce water.
The Chief Minister said that the ‘Haryana Pond and Waste Water Management Authority’ has been declared the nodal agency for coordination and monitoring of entire development work of ponds. Specific development works such as laying of sewerage pipelines, pucca drains for drainage of waste water to pond, waste water treatment, digging of ponds, construction of bandhs, plantation of aquatic plants/grass track around the pond, water supply and drainage in the pond, minor irrigation with additional water, fisheries and pond water quality monitoring, etc., will be looked after by this authority.
“Further, to promote micro irrigation and utilize the treated waste water from 35 existing STPs, a project for installation of community based solar/grid powered integrated micro-irrigation infrastructure with On-Farm Micro-Irrigation in various districts of the State has also been approved under the Micro Irrigation Fund of NABARD. After the implementation of this project, discharge of waste water in river Yamuna and Ghaggar will be prevented and the water will be recycled for use,” said the Chief Minister.
Canal Projects approved from the NABARD likely to start in the first quarter of 2021-22
The Chief Minister said that in order to increase and restore the carrying capacity of major irrigation networks to utilize available surplus water during monsoon period in river Yamuna, the Government has got approvals for projects of rehabilitation of parallel Delhi branch, augmentation canal, Jawaharlal Nehru Canal and Hansi Branch from the NABARD. The work on these projects is likely to start in the first quarter of 2021-22. Besides, a project for the rehabilitation of Bhalaut branch has been posed to NABARD.
The Chief Minister said that Rehabilitation of the old dilapidated irrigation canal network in the State, control of seepage and other losses, and increasing the carrying capacity of canals are among the topmost priorities of the Government. Rehabilitation work of about 110 channels is in progress. In addition, the Government is committed to providing water at each tail of southern Haryana by putting special thrust on improving capacity and efficiency of Lift Irrigation System in Rewari, Mahendragarh, Charkhi Dadri and Bhiwani.
Re -construction/renovation of old dilapidated bridges on canals prioritized
The Chief Minister said that the State Government has prioritized the re-construction/renovation of old dilapidated bridges on canals and drains in a phased manner. The State Government is vigorously pursuing the construction of up-stream storage dams -- Renuka, Kishau and Lakhwar Vyasi on river Yamuna for getting assured water supply from Yamuna River and its tributaries Giri and Tons.
Revival of holy Saraswati River
The Chief Minister said that for the revival of holy Saraswati River, a project for the construction of Adibadri Dam, Somb Saraswati Barrage and Somb Saraswati Reservoir, with net live storage capacity of 1680 hectare meters during non-monsoon, is under consideration, informed the Chief Minister.
He said that the Haryana Government proposes to construct a dam upstream of Hathnikund barrage in the Yamuna river course lying from Ponta Sahib to Kalesar. This will store flood water generated by the balance about 20.43 per cent of the left out catchment area from the already proposed three upstream storage dams, namely, Renuka dam, Kishau dam and Lakhwar-Vyasi dam, he added.
The Chief Minister further informed that the proposed dam will also act as a balancing reservoir for these upstream storage dams to give the dam authorities free hand for peaking of power as per their requirement. The preliminary report will be prepared during the coming financial year for approval of the partner states and the Central Water Commission.