Survey of Barak, Surma, Kushiyara to start this yr
JRC decides at Zakiganj meeting
India-Bangladesh Joint River Commission (JRC) will start survey of trans-border Barak, Surma and Kushiyara rivers in the Sylhet-Assam region during the dry season this year.
"Officials of the JRC's Assam-Sylhet regional chapter at a meeting on Wednesday decided to resume their work shortly and agreed to take measures for stopping erosion on Surma and Kushiyara rivers," said Md Shafiqul Islam, executive engineer of Bangladesh Water Development Board (BWBD) in Sylhet.
"The officials agreed to run a field survey on 14 kilometre of the Surma River and seven kilometres of the Kushiyara River from their origin at Amolshid on Indo-Bangla border. Dredging would follow the survey. The officials also decided to stop erosion through protection works and dumping boulders on the banks of two rivers," he added.
BWDB Chief Engineer of the north-eastern region Nurul Ala led the eight-member Bangladesh team while Chief engineer of Water resources, Assam, Ranadhir Basu led the Indians in the meeting held at Zakiganj WDB rest house.
The officials later visited some of the badly affected habitats on the bank of Kushiyara at Bhuiyarmora, Lakshmibazar and Amolshid.
The Barak, headstream of Surma and Kushiyara rivers, originates in the hills of Manipur state in India and flows in a meandering course. Entering Bangladesh, it bifurcates into the Surma and the Kushiyara near the border at Amolshid.
"The meeting was held in a cordial atmosphere. We hope the field survey would be conducted in the dry season this year," BWDB Superintending Engineer Syed Ahsan Ali said on return from the meeting.
Although the decision to run joint survey and model study on the shared rivers of the region was first taken in 2005, activities of the regional JRC remained suspended for years due to the inaction of the Indian side.
The JRC regional committee at a meeting at Silchar in the Indian state of Assam on December 20-21, 2005 decided to start joint survey of the bordering rivers Barak, Surma and Kushiyara. Later in January 2006 and again in April 2007, it took the same decision.
Bangladesh has already lost about 3,000 acres of land while huge tracts of land have emerged on the Indian side, due to severe erosion along these two rivers due to lack of proper dredging.
The Kushiyara and the Surma share the total discharge of the Barak in proportion of about 80:20 during the monsoon, causing serious erosion of all concave banks from Amolshid to Gazukata and it affects bordering land areas of both the countries.
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