Project to fight Assam floods

Guwahati, Feb 16 : Dispur is pinning its hopes of ridding the state of its perennial erosion and flooding woes on a new technique.

Assam planning and development and water resources minister Prithibi Majhi today told The Telegraph that the Centre has given its nod to a pilot project, which would use geo-textile fabric technology for the construction of a 5km embankment at Matmora in Lakhimpur district.

This is for the first time the technology will be used in the country to content erosion and flood. If successful, it would be emulated in the rest of the state and the country in combating flood and erosion.

The minister said the new technology could be the solution to the state’s biggest problem of flood and erosion. Chief minister Tarun Gogoi will lay the foundation stone of the embankment on Monday.

The government is, however, yet to finalise the agency that would carry out the construction. 

“We are looking for a suitable agency to carry out the work. But in the meantime, we want to go ahead with the formalities of foundation stone-laying,” Majhi said.

The Centre will provide 90 per cent funds of the Rs 142 crore project as grant, while the remaining 10 per cent will be the state’s share. The original proposal submitted by the state government was of Rs 206 crore.

But after a feasibility study, the Union ministry of water resources had sanctioned Rs 142 crore.

“The technology, though is costlier than the traditional method of constructing embankment with boulders and clay, is seen as a long- term solution to the problem of erosion and deluge,” Majhi said.

In the third wave of floods last year, the Brahmaputra had breached about 200 metres of embankment at Matmora causing havoc in Lakhimpur and the adjoining Dhemaji districts.

“The regular breaches in the embankments constructed in traditional methods forced the government to think of an out-of-the-box solution and geo-textile fabric provides exactly that,” Majhi said.

The CEO of the Mumbai-based Jeevan Products, an ISO 9001 company which deals in geo-textile fabric, Aditya Agarwal, said the fabric is useful to prevent erosion as it helps retain the soil. 

He said there are many methods of using the fabric to prevent flood and erosion. But the most commonly used method was using of geo-textile fabric tubes, or bags of geo-textile fabrics. In this method, sand is filled in the bag and placed along the bank of the river so as to make a retaining wall. Agarwal said minimum longevity of such a wall is 30 to 40 years.

“If an embankment is constructed with boulders or other materials, what happens is that when the water that had sipped in while coming out brings along with it soil. This weakens the surface and ultimately causes breaches in the embankment,” he said.

“The particles in geo-textile fabrics are so small that they allow only water to come out of it while retaining the soil,” he added. He said there are many methods of using the fabric to prevent flood and erosion. But the most commonly used method was using of geo-textile fabric tubes, or bags of geo-textile fabrics. In this method, sand is filled in the bag and placed along the bank of the river so as to make a retaining wall. Agarwal said minimum longevity of such a wall is 30 to 40 years.

He, however, could not explain much about the technology saying it was a new method being tried in India.