A CRITICAL REVIEW OF DIFFERENT TYPES OF CANAL LININGS WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO TUNGABHADRA HIGH LEVEL CANAL

Abstract

The country has a total land area of 327-.0 million hectares out of which 156-.6 million hectares is cultivable, the balance being used for forests, pastures and other non-agricul-tural area including habitation etc. The agricultural area is practically the same today as it even was hundred of years ago. The requirements of agricultural produce is now doubling every 35 years for meeting the needs of the rising population which is now increasing at an average rate of 2.5% per annum. The increased produce per unit area can be obtained only by provid-ing assured irrigation to ever increasing area of agricultural land and adopting improved agricultural practices. The country is estimated to possess an utilizable runoff of 55,0 million hectare metre/year out of which 30% i.e. 19.3 million hectare metre/year was utilised beyond of 3rd five year plan (1966) providing irrigation facilities to 36 million hectares of land i.e. to 23% of cultivable land. It is estimated that the available run off in the country can provide assured irrigation to maximum of 75 million hectares of land. The readily available sources of water having been already utilised, further development of water for irrigation purposes is now us costing quite a good deal of money. It has therefore become imperative that water resources are used economically and effeciently during operation stage keeping in view the limited resources and increased costs of its development.,..