Flood management in Mahanadi basin

Abstract

The Mahanadi basin is one of the major basins of eastern part of India. The total catchment area of the basin is 141,569 sq. km comprises major part of two states Chhatisgarh and Orissa. It lies between 80⁰-30' to 86⁰-50' of East Longitude and 19⁰-20' to 23⁰-35' of North Latitude. The major reservoir Hirakud with 83400 sq.km. of catchment lies at central part of the Mahanadi basin. The downstream part below Hirakund having a catchment of around 50,000 sq.km. contributes substantially to flood at delta and is devoid of any sound flood forecasting system. This part has three main tributaries like Jeera, Ong and Tel with catchments 2383, 5128 and 25,045 sq.km, respectively. Therefore, the contribution from the Tel catchment always remains predominant. Even the flood of 2008 is mainly due to the contribution of this tributary. It has produced a peak discharge of 33,762 cursecs during 2008. The river Tel joins at Patharla to the main river Mahanadi. Controlling flood through other structural measures is inadequate and difficult. The downstream part is devoid of a sound flood forecasting method. In order to protect the life and property, a non-structural measure like a workable flood forecasting model is needed to mitigate the destruction at delta by enhancing appropriate and timely relief measures. In this study flood problems in Mahanadi is discussed in detail. Furthermore, the paper stresses upon the various flood management practices being utilized to mitigate the flood problems in Mahanadi basin.