ISLAMABAD, Aug 14: Warning that the Indus Waters Treaty of 1960 between India and Pakistan would soon become redundant because of silting of dams, a veteran water expert has advised the government to immediately start working on development of the 35 million acre feet (MAF) Katzarah dam to prolong operational life of reservoirs and protect the country’s agriculture and industry.

“The unique Katzarah dam is the only proposed storage that will provide food security, conserve 35MAF of water every year, generate 15,000MW of electricity, prevent silting of existing reservoirs, replenish 6.6 MAF of storage capacity lost to silting and end loadshedding and super floods,” said Engineer Fatehullah Khan Gundapur who headed the Indus River System Authority in the early 1990s.

Talking to Dawn, he said the proposed dam could increase the life of Diamer-Bhasha dam, irrigating the entire Kachhi (Sibi) plain of Balochistan from the Chashma barrage by gravity flow.

Also, the project along with Guroh Dop and Diamer-Bhasha dam could lead to water management of 45MAF of wasteful, incompatible and obsolete canal irrigation system.

“I strongly urge the government to give top priority to the Katzarah dam and complete it in nine to 10 years,” he said.

He deplored that Wapda had failed to meet its commitment of completing its detailed feasibility study by Sept 2005 it had made with two high-powered consensus committees, a parliamentary committee led by former Senator Nisar Memon and technical committee led by A.N.G. Abbasi.

Mr Gundapur who is over 92 years of age and has authored two books said the proposed dam will serve as replacement dam for the Indus Waters Treaty as the country had already lost 6.6 MAF of replacement storage created in Tarbela and Mangla reservoirs under the treaty.

“This means the life of the treaty ends with the silting of reservoir,” he said and added it required perennial replenishment by new storage for the revival of the treaty.

Moreover, the Katzarah dam will regulate the highly erratic flow of the Indus that varied between the minimum of 9,000 cusecs to the maximum of 1,200,000 cusecs.

“Katzarah is a multipurpose dam, a carryover dam, development dam and inter-seasonal dam, but it was not understandable why the authorities are showing complacency”.

He said the proposed storage was unique in the sense that it had probably the narrowest dam site in the world with only 300 feet at the bed level compared with Kalabagh dam’s two miles long and Tarbela dam’s 8,000 feet long bed level.He said the project would function as watershed management dam by stopping silt erosion from the world’s highly erodible soil in the Skardu valley, thus prolonging the lifespan of Bhasha dam from 80 years to 800 years and extend lifespan of Tarbela by 50 years.

It was the tallest dam in the world, six times the storage of Diamer-Bhasha or Kalabagh dam and the third largest dam in the world after Aswan dam in Egypt and Three Gorges Dam in China.

Its 15,000MW of power generation capacity is the second largest in the world after the Three Gorges Dam and has over 1,000 years of life span.

“Instead of investing in 1,000 years, Wapda people are investing in 50 and 80 years despite the fact that Katzarah has storage capacity of all the conceivable dams in Pakistan. It has the cheapest dam per million acre feet of storage, per megawatt of hydropower, per year of service value and longest lifespan,” he said.

Mr Gundapur said the proposed dam would also help implement para 2, 4, 6, and 14 (e) of the 1991 Water Accord by storing more water and end bitter provincial water dispute, resulting in non-implementation of the accord in full even after 20 years.

He deplored that India had built 32 multipurpose dams in 35 years in occupied Kashmir to stop Pakistan’s waters.