Ganges Canal

The Ganges or Ganga Canal is a canal system that irrigates the Doab region between the Ganges River and the Yamuna River in India.

The canal is primarily an irrigation canal, although parts of it were also used for navigation, primarily for its construction materials. Separate navigation channels with lock gates were provided on this system for boats to negotiate falls. Originally constructed from 1842 to 1854, for an original head discharge of 6000 ft³/s. The Upper Ganges Canal has since been enlarged gradually for the present head discharge of 10,500 ft³/s (295 m³/s). The system consists of main canal of 272 miles and about 4000 miles long distribution channels. The canal system irrigates nearly 9,000 km² of fertile agricultural land in ten districts of Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand. Today the canal is the source of agricultural prosperity in much of these states, and the irrigation departments of these states actively maintain the canal against a fee system charged from users.

There are some small hydroelectric plants on the canal capable of generating about 33MW if running at full capacity these are at Nirgajini, Chitaura, Salawa, Bhola, Jani, Jauli and Dasna .

The canal is administritatively divided into the Upper Ganges Canal from Haridwar to Aligarh, with some branches, and the Lower Ganges Canal which constitutes several branches below Aligarh.

The Upper Ganges canal is the original Ganges Canal, which starts at the Bhimgoda Barrage near Har ki Pauri at Haridwar, traverses Meerut and Bulandshahr and continues to Nanau in Aligarh district, where it bifurcates into the Kanpur and Etawah branches.

A highway running along the Upper Ganges canal has been proposed several times. In 2010, it was turned since it would "lead to uprooting of around 100,000 trees, damaging the Fauna & Flora and destroying the natural habitat of wildlife" At some places boundary of Hastinapur Wildlife Sanctuary is as close as about 500-600 meter away only from the proposed UGC Expressway site. There are two other substitute roads - NH-58 and the KAWAR MARG already existing to transportation. An environmental activist Vijaypal Baghel is opposing strongly of this project. Also, the proposal by the Mayavati government was criticized as trying to subvert the environmental issues by splitting the proposal in five different parts.

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Wikipedia