The mighty Padma is now a sandy beach. The river is drying up day by day due to the influence of Farakka. The volume of the Padma has reduced by half in four decades. There is no way to understand that it is a river by looking at the vast sandbanks that have arisen in the river. In the past few years, several tributaries of the Padma in this region have also dried up. Millions of farmers are being affected.
Except during the monsoon, water is not seen at Rajshahi point on the Padma. There is water in the river for 2-1 months of the year and sand and sand for the rest of the time. As a result, there has been no flood of any kind in Rajshahi and the surrounding areas in the last decade.
The direct victims of Farakka are the people of Rajshahi. Due to low water flow, the riverbed is gradually filling up. Several species of fish have become extinct. Ganges dolphins and gharials are no longer seen. The Padma does not have the same number of hilsa fish as before. The lives of millions of people have been devastated by the loss of various river-based professions.
Water experts say that as long as the Padma was able to flow in its own way, its form was pristine. But since the establishment of the Farakka Barrage in India in April 1775, the Padma has been deteriorating day by day.
The water level at Rajshahi Point has been decreasing during the dry season. This year, the water level here dropped to 6.95 meters on May 12. This is the lowest level this year. Even during the monsoon season, there is no water flow like before.
A study shows that the area of the Rajshahi section has decreased by 50 percent during the dry season compared to 1984. The water depth has decreased by 17.8 percent. The flow has decreased by 26.2 percent. The supply of freshwater in the southern Sundarbans has decreased by 90 percent. On January 1, 2023, the water flow in the Ganges was 90,730 cusecs. On January 1, 2024, the water flow was 75,409 cusecs. In just one year, the water flow in the Ganges has decreased by 15,321 cusecs. Although the average rainfall that year was 19.2 percent less than previous years.
A press conference was held in Rajshahi on Thursday on the harmful effects of Farakka. It was said that due to the illegal withdrawal of water from hundreds of rivers in India, including the Ganges, about 20 million farmers in the northern region have been affected by the lack of irrigation water. About 40 million people in the southern and central regions of the country have been affected by the lack of irrigation water. Due to the shortage of water in the Ganga-Kapotaksha project, irrigation is being severely disrupted in 65 percent of the areas. Due to the decrease in the supply of fresh water from upstream, salinity has increased in the southern region of the country. As a result, the fertility of the land is decreasing. In the Barendra region, especially in Upper Barendra, 100 percent of the deep tube wells have become useless. 21 percent of the shallow tube wells are almost ineffective. Due to the toxic effect of arsenic in groundwater, tube well water has become unfit for drinking in many districts of the northern and northwestern regions. In the greater Khulna region, the amount of salinity has increased, which has reduced the production of conventional rice. The biodiversity of the Sundarbans in the Khulna and Satkhira regions is being affected due to the lack of fresh water.
Rajshahi Water Development Board Executive Engineer Arifur Rahman Ankur told Daily Industry, “We may be getting water as per the agreement with India. But this water is not sufficient for us. The water agreement will expire next year. After that, it will be discussed anew. Then the issues will come up.”
In this regard, Professor Sarwar Jahan of the Department of Geology and Mineralogy of Rajshahi University said, “The biggest problem of the Farakka Barrage is the lack of water. With the decrease in the water level of the Padma, its connected rivers have become waterless. There is no water in the Mahananda, Atrai, Punarbhaba and Burnai rivers. The connected canals, water bodies and groundwater are gradually going down.”
River researcher Mahbub Siddiqui said, “The people of this region are suffering extreme losses due to the impact of Farakka. No neighboring country in the world has behaved like this. We now have to ensure our fair rights. We have to be vocal about our demands. There is no room for a knee-jerk foreign policy here.”
He said, “The new agreement must include a guarantee clause like the 1977 agreement. Nepal must be included in the Joint River Commission and meetings must be held at the appropriate time as per the rules.”
In this regard, Professor Mostafizur Rahman of the Department of Environmental Science at Jahangirnagar University told Daily Industry, ‘As the river becomes smaller and the water flow decreases, the riverbed is filling up. As a result, the river is not able to hold additional water during the rainy season. On the one hand, the river is drying up and creating a long-term drought.’
