Speedy Clearance Expected in Sawalkote Hydro Project

Four Projects, Which Together Can Produce 3,119 MW, Have Been Hobbled by Long Delays Due to the Indus Waters Treaty

- Zia Haq

NEW DELHI: The Union government is looking to give speedy clearance to a ₹22,700-crore hydropower project in Sawalkote on the Chenab so that work can commence by next year and the power ministry is on track to decide which agency should build it, two officials aware of the development said.

The Sawalkote project, among four proposed hydroelectric projects in Jammu and Kashmir, has been granted the status of a nationally important project and is expected to generate 1,856 megawatts (MW) of electricity, one of the officials said.

The four projects, which together can produce 3,119 MW of electricity, have been hobbled by long administrative delays as well as due to restrictions imposed by the Indus Waters Treaty, which India decided to put on hold a day after the deadly terrorist attack in Jammu and Kashmir's Pahalgam on April 22 that claimed 26 lives.

Apart from power, the Sawalkote dam, a so-called run-of-the-river project, will also bring irrigation potential to large agricultural tracts, a second official said, adding it will come up in the Ramban, Batote, Mahore and Udhampur forest divisions abutting the Raman, Reasi and Udhampur districts of the Union territory.