The Indus River System Authority has stopped withdrawal of water from the Tarbela dam on the river Indus and Mangla dam on the river Jhelum as Punjab has closed all its perennial and non-perennial canals to preserve the precious resource for sowing and growing the strategic Rabi crops including the nation's staple food wheat, fodder for live stock, oilseeds, grams, maize, lentils, winter vegetables etc in the canal irrigated areas starting from next month.

The closure of water discharges from the dams has dropped about 4,000 MW cheap electricity produced by the hydel power generation units of Tarbela and Mangla dams.

According to the water report of WAPDA about the position of the river inflows and outflows at Tarbela, Mangla, Chashma, Taunsa, Panjnad, Guddu, Sukkur and Kotri barrages, along with the reservoirs levels, the national water regulatory body is releasing only run of the river water of Indus and Kabul rivers for usages of the Sindh province whereas water discharge downstream the Mangla dam has been totally stopped as under:

Rivers: Indus at Tarbela: Inflows 27,800 cusecs and Outflows 30,000 cusecs, Kabul at Nowshera: Inflows 5000 cusecs and Outflows 5000 cusecs, Jhelum at Mangla: Inflows 8600 cusecs and Outflows 100 cusecs, Chenab at Marala: Inflows 12200 cusecs and Outflows 7200 cusecs.

Barrages: Jinnah: Inflows 57,300 cusecs and Outflows 53,300 cusecs, Chashma: Inflows 41,000 cusecs and Outflows 33,000 cusecs, Taunsa: Inflows 41,300 cusecs and Outflows 41,300 cusecs, Panjnad: Inflows 2800 cusecs and Outflows 2800 cusecs Guddu: Inflows 48,500 cusecs and Outflows 39,200 cusecs, Sukkur: Inflows 35600 cusecs and Outflows 9700, Kotri: Inflows 12,800 cusecs and Outflows Nil.

Reservoirs storage:

Tarbela: 2.600 million acre feet (MAF) and Mangla 2.004 MAF.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2018