‘Supplementary at best': Ex-Union secretary rejects sociologist’s alternatives to Kalpasar

In a  sharp rejoinder over the proposed Kalpasar reservoir project in the Gulf of Khambhat, with former Government of India Secretary Babubhai Navalawala has dismissed the alternatives floated by veteran sociologist Prof. Vidyut Joshi as mere “supplements” rather than substitutes for the mega project.

In the rejoinder to Prof. Joshi’s recent column Samudra Manthan in Gujarati daily Sandesh (see news item here), Navalawala has argued that the scientific options suggested by the sociologist cannot replace Kalpasar. 

Quoting from the rejoinder, Navalawala states: “These scientific options should not be considered as substitutes or replacements for the proposed Kalpasar Project. Rather, they can only be treated as supplements to it.”

Citing data from an attached concept note on Kalpasar, Navalawala points out that the total water storage from all the proposed alternative measures put together would amount to “at most about 15 percent of the storage of the proposed Kalpasar reservoir, which is approximately 13,000 million cubic metres.” The concept note, which lists over 30 studies already carried out by expert bodies including IIT Roorkee, NIOT, NIO Goa, CSIR-CSMCRI and NEERI, underscores the massive scale of the planned reservoir. 

Navalawala also raised legal and practical hurdles. “Among the rivers for which you have proposed alternatives, particularly the Mahi river, one cannot ignore the existing interstate water dispute,” he writes. 

He further notes that most river-specific alternatives would involve land submergence and rehabilitation issues, including forest land, and that “the very concerns you have highlighted as a sociologist about displacement would apply to these scattered alternatives, perhaps even more severely.”

According to the concept note attached with the rejoinder – a detailed compilation of investigations carried out, ongoing, and envisaged for Kalpasar – several studies are already in progress, including geotechnical investigations along the dam alignment, water quality monitoring, and hydraulic model studies by the Central Water and Power Research Station (CWPRS). The note also lists planned studies on irrigation canals, pumping stations, and wind-solar power plants.

While acknowledging that work on feasible scientific alternatives should begin even before Kalpasar becomes a ground reality, Navalawala stressed that they must be pursued in parallel, not as a replacement. 

“They must be seen as complementary to Kalpasar,” he concluded. The exchange highlights a deepening debate over one of Gujarat’s most ambitious and contentious water infrastructure projects.