Assessment of Water availability up to Daudhan dam site of Ken basin for Ken-Betwa link project

Abstract

Ken-Betwa, a multipurpose water development project, is one of the components of the proposed National River Linking Project (NRLP) of India. The Ken-Betwa Link Project (KBP) is an independent link in the peninsular component that connects two small north-flowing rivers, namely, the Ken and Betwa rivers in the Greater Ganga Basin. The KBLP is located in the Bundelkhand region of Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh in India. The KBLP envisages diverting the Ken River water from the Daudhan reservoir through a canal to the Betwa River to provide irrigation to the water scarce Bundelkhand region. The proposed Daudhan dam is the principal contribution to the large storage volume under the Ken-Betwa link project. Therefore, the present study aims to assess water availability at the Daudhan dam site for the Ken-Betwa link project to make the success rate of diversion of demands for the KBLP system. This assessment is based on the latest land use, groundwater statistics, project requirements, population census and norms of ecological & environmental requirements by 2050AD. Thus, an attempt has been made to develop the rainfall and runoff relationship for the runoff estimation based on the latest observed rainfall and runoff data. The water availability of the Ken basin up to the Daudhan dam site by 2050 has been compared with the outputs of the Detailed Project Report of KBLP carried out by the NWDA prepared earlier.