Water to be released from Tenughat dam only after green signal from DVRRC: DVC chief

Kolkata: Damodar Valley Corporation (DVC) chairman P K Mukhopadhyay assured on Thursday that water will be released from Tenughat dam in Jharkhand, only after consultation with Damodar Valley River Regulation Committee (DVRRC), which looks after water discharge.

Making it clear that DVC has been maintaining very good relations with the Bengal government, Mukhopadhyay said that talks have already been held with the officials of the state Irrigation department and another meeting is scheduled to be held very soon, to ensure that Bengal is not inconvenienced by any means due to release of water from Tenughat dam in the monsoon season.

It may be mentioned that Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and state Irrigation minister Rajib Banerjee has alleged time and again that DVC officials did not inform the government before releasing water from the dams, resulting in flood-like situation in a number of districts in Bengal.

"If we are informed some time before the release, then we can make arrangements to shift the people from vulnerable areas," an official in the state Irrigation department said.

Responding to a poser on the blame game between state government and DVC, Bandyopadhyay said, "I am not aware of any such things in the recent past. We maintain a very cordial relationship and we are hopeful that there will be absolutely no problem in this regard this year."

It may be mentioned that there is a committee comprising representatives of DVC, Central Water Commission and governments of Bengal and Jharkhand.

"We usually provide updates on release of water from different dams to the committee every three hours," a DVC official said.

It may be mentioned that in July 2017, several areas of Bankura, West Midnapore and Hooghly were flooded due to alleged indiscriminate release of water by DVC.

The situation had reached such a flashpoint that state Chief Secretary Malay De had to speak to his Jharkhand counterpart Raj Bala Verma and request her to maintain a check on the release of water.