Opinion (Spotlight Weekly)

India China And Kosi Navigation Canal

By AB Thapa

The 1997 Kosi Study Agreement between Nepal and India could help to open up new vistas of cooperation between the world's two emerging superpowers - China and India. The proposed Kosi canal waterway would be able to provide the most cost effective and at the same time the shortest route for the transportation of goods between the Tibetan region of the China and the Calcutta seaport, along with other big commercial centers in South Asia. There would only be a very short gap between the last navigation terminal on the Arun River ( tributary of the Kosi River) and the southern boundary of China if a navigation lift is provided to allow the river vessels to get across the proposed Kosi high dam.. The Kosi navigation could have extremely favourable impact in rapid development of the Tibetan region of the China. The documents published by the Chinese Academy of Sciences describing the vast natural resources potential to be exploited in Tibet explain ì The narrow mountain gorges hold promise of enormous hydropower, and the whole area is rich in mineral deposits. Thus, far from being a uniform, desolate wasteland, as is commonly supposed, the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau offers a wealth of varied natural resources.'

China India Economic Cooperation

In recent years India and China have entered into a new era of economic cooperation. In the four years since 1999-2000, India's annual exports to China have increased by more than three times. Similarly the China's exports to India have also soared. The mutual mistrust and fear that dominated the relationship between these two countries in the past are gradually vanishing and their place is being taken by new conviction that the prosperity of both the countries is inevitable. It is very interesting to know the recent remarks made by the Indian Foreign Minister Mr. Yashwant Sinha on this matter ìIndia's policies will not be based on fear of Chinese power, nor envy of its achievements. They will be based on the conviction that a prosperous India is inevitable. So is a prosperous China.î

The recent visit of the Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee to China has been hailed by Indian press as a historic visit that has brought both the countries closer. It is becoming increasingly clear that India as well as other countries in South Asia can hope to gain a lot by promoting trade with China. It has been very recently reported in the journal INDIA TODAY that with the US economy in a limbo, and Japan and Europe stagnating, the importance of China as a low-cost, efficient manufacturing base and burgeoning market make it very attractive to investors. Foreign investors have pumped over $ 400 billion into China since 1979, turning it into the world's third largest economy. Over the past five years, China's giant state-owned enterprises and entrepreneurs have also become global investors, aggressively buying market-share in foreign markets, including India. China's market for most products is 3-4 times the size of the Indian market. Its annual exports of $ 280 billion are five times that of India. Similarly its GDP ($1.2 trillion ) and per capita income ($1,100) are more than double of India's.

Origin of the Kosi Canal Navigation Plan

The Kosi river is now on the verge of shifting to the east far away from its present course. The peoples of Nepal and India are heading for a natural disaster of an unprecedented scale Solutions to the Kosi floods problem should be quickly found. All the works to be carried out for the flood protection should be completed in time. Provision of dams in the drainage area with very big storage volume has been identified to be the only lasting solution to the Kosi flood problem. It is the opinion of the renowned experts and scientists involved in the Kosi study in the past.

Nepal and India had few years back agreed to carry out detailed studies of the Kosi development works primarily to avert the Kosi flood disaster. Components of the Kosi development works have already been identified in the 1997 Indo-Nepal agreement to conduct jointly the feasibility studies. The feasibility studies would cover the Sun-Kosi high dam project, the Kosi high dam project and a navigation canal linking Nepal with the seaport. It has also been established that the Sun-Kosi high dam should be built first on technical ground and moreover this project should be completed at the earliest to avert the possibility of the Kosi river changing its course in near future that would have disastrous consequences for our region. The 165 km long navigation canal extending from Chatra in Nepal to the Ganges river in India would be the most important component of the Kosi development works equally benefiting both Nepal and India that would help to promote the commerce and industrial development in our region. About 120 km long stretch of the proposed navigation canal would have to be dug in the Indian territory.

India's National Waterway No.1

The Kosi navigation canal will be linked with the National Waterway No.1 of India. The stretch of the waterway between Allahabad and Haldia has been declared the National Waterway No. 1 of India. The total length of this waterway is 1580 km. The National Waterway No.1 of India includes the Bhagirathi, Hoogly and the lower and middle reaches of the Ganges. This waterway can be broadly divided into three sections. They are the Haldia-Farakka, Farakka-Patna, and Patna-Allahabad sections, and the length of each of these sections is 500 km, 480 km, and 600 km respectively.

The meeting point of the Kosi waterway with the Ganges expected to be not far away upstream from the Farakka barrage would be within the upper reach of the Farakka reservoir. So this reach of the Ganges between Kursella, the meeting point of the Kosi navigation canal with the Ganges, and Farakka would be having sufficiently big water depths.

Layout of the Kosi Navigation Canal

The Kosi Navigation Canal vis-a-vis the India's National Waterway No.1 would provide Nepal an access to the sea. This waterway should be planned on a par with the capacities adopted for the navigation channel at Farakka that links the Ganges with the Bhagirathi river. The proposed Kosi navigation canal can be divided into two reaches. They are the 45 km long upper reach between the Chatra and Birpur( near Indo-Nepal border) and the 120 km long lower reach between the Birpur and the Ganges. The Upper Reach Canal will be entirely in Nepalese territory.

It has been proposed in the Kosi High Dam Project Report prepared by the Government of India to build a canal from Chatra to the Birpur area to deliver silt free water from the Kosi storage reservoir for irrigating lands in India to the east of the Kosi river. This canal would be 130 m wide. There is a drop of about 40 metres between Chatra and the Birpur. It is proposed to build three powerhouses along the proposed canal to utilize the topographical gradient for the generation of electricity. The capacity of each such power station is expected to be about 100 MW.

The canal proposed to be built for delivering water from Chatra to the Birpur for irrigation and power generation could also be used for navigation purposes. The proposed irrigation canal is sufficiently wide for use as a navigation canal. However, the canal would require significant modifications A navigation canal requires that adequate water depths would be maintained in the canal at all places and at all times. Similarly it would also be necessary to take into account the matters related to free board, and the protection of the bank and the bottom of the proposed canal. The canal would be needing navigation locks for negotiating the fall across the powerhouses. There would be three locks parallel to the powerhouse in the upper reach canal between Chatra and Birpur. The exact size of these navigation locks should be adopted based on a very careful study.

The Lower Reach Kosi canal would be completely in the Indian territory. The north-south slope of the lands in this reach of the Kosi canal would be less steep compared to the slope of the lands in the upper reach. Nonetheless there is a drop of about 40 m in a north-south distance of 120 km. It might be necessary to provide 3 to 4 locks to negotiate this drop. These drops could also be used for power generation. Similarly the navigation channel running to the Ganges could be used for delivering water for irrigation. For this purpose the outlets from this canal will have to be provided without cross regulators.

Waterways and Economy

With the development of rail transport in the 19th century, canals declined as the dominant carriers of freight in the United States and Britain. In continental Europe such adverse impact was not noticeable because the navigation canals in Europe were larger in size. Wherever the canals were small, they were enlarged. To meet competition from road transportation, with its greater flexibility and higher speeds, water transport has in its advantage the capacity for larger units thus there was tremendous rise in size of the vessels. As a result, the 300-ton barges operating economically early in the last century have been replaced by crafts as large as 1,350 tons and more. In Europe, push tows normally operate with fewer than six barges, but on the Mississippi, with its deep channel, a push tow may aggregate 40,000 tons, an assembly of 40 barges being controlled by one 9,000 horsepower push tug. On the Ohio River the original 600-foot lock chambers were lengthened to 1,200 feet to obviate double lockage. The development of canal waterways continued in Europe and North America in 19th and 20th centuries also.

Waterways must provide larger tonnage units than those possible on road or rail in order to be competitive. Modern waterway engineering, therefore, is directed towards provididng channels suitable for larger vessels to travel faster by reducidng delays at locks or from darkness and other natural hazards. In the last century existing small canals were upgraded and many new canals much larger in size were built in Europe. In Germany the 467 km long Mittelland Canal was opened in 1938 that completed the east-west link in a system of about 11,265 km of inland waterways, extending from the Dortmund-Ems Canal east of the Rhine to the Elbe north of Magdeburg. The Nord-Sud Canal (or Elbe-Seitenkanal) was completed in 1976. This canal leaves the Elbe about 20 miles above Hamburg and, running south, joins the Mittelland Canal near Wolfsburg and shortening the route between Hamburg and the Ruhr by 134 miles. The Main-Danube canal connecting the Rhine with the Black Sea was completed in 1992.

France's many of the low capacity canals are being raised to the 1,350-ton standard. A major development planned in the 1970s in cooperation with West Germany was the construction to this standard of the North Sea-Mediterranean waterway via the canalized Rhone and Rhine rivers. The Rhine has been navigable between Basel and Rheinfelden since 1934. In The Netherlands the extensive canal system based on large natural rivers and serving the ports of Rotterdam and Amsterdam has required relatively small improvement. The Juliana Canal was built in 1935 to bypass the Meuse River between Roermond and Maastricht and it was further improved after Second World War. The Twente Canal opened in 1936.

India's Bitter Past Experience

Unfortunately India, in the past, did not pay attention to new developments taking place in the field of canal navigation. As a result, the navigation component of the Durgapore barrage project ended in a complete failure. This project taken up for construction as late as 1950s was under the Damodar Valley Corporation, an Indian model of the famous TVA of the USA. The left bank canal, 120 km in length, was designed to permit navigation by small barges only 250 ton in capacity. It had been established since a long time that such small barges would have difficulties to compete with the railways. Apart from it, the poundage too was very small. There are 22 locks in a stretch of just 161 km. Because of these drawbacks, the canal has remained unused for navigation. Fortunately now it seems India has realized her mistakes. Those matters related with economy have been fully taken care of in the design of the navigation component of the recently built Farakka barrage.

The navigation component of the Farakka barrage has been designed paying full attention to the present global trends with respect to size. The bed width of the 37.5 km long feeder canal is 150 m. The channel depth at full supply level is 6 m. The navigation lock has two chambers, each 25.15 meters wide and 180.7 meters long. The lock system is adequate for barge upto 1,500 ton capacity. Provision has been made for adding a second lock at future stage.

In Conclusion

While conducting the feasibility study of the Kosi navigation canal we should take full advantage of the vast experience the continental Europe has gained in the field of inland navigation. We should not allow the Durgapore navigation canal mistake to be once again repeated. The size of the Kosi navigation canal and its related structures such as the lock system should be determined in conformity with the size already adopted by India in design of the Farakka barrage navigation system which corresponds to the recommended size in Europe. In conducting the study of the Kosi navigation canal it might be worth examining the prospect for using it to provide transportation facility to Tibet also.

(Thapa writes on water resources)