Irrigation in Gujarat got a dynamic lift as the ‘world’s largest water pumping station by volume’ started pushing 230 cubic meters of water per seconds (cumecs) into the parched Saurashtra region of the state yesterday. This will increase to 410 cumecs after expansion of phases III and IV, with the total five-station system pumping 5,40,000 lakh litres of water per day into Saurashtra when completed, thereby, irrigating 5.4 lakh hectares of area in Saurashtra that constitutes about one-third of the total command area of the Sardar Sarovar Project (SSP). In addition, 4,620 villages and towns in the region would get drinking water supply.Switching on one of the gigantic motors into action at Kadu chainage of the Saurashtra Branch Canal (SBC), some 100 km from Ahmedabad in Surendranagar district, Chief Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the phase I and II of the Saurashtra system of the Narmada project.The feat of lifting 230 cubic meters of water per second to a height of 71 m against the steep gradient of the Saurashtra peninsula in five stages will be achieved using 16 high tension concrete and vertical motors, and a siphon system that has been patented in the US by manufacturers Kirloskar Brothers Ltd. An elated Modi congratulated the Kirloskar team led by its chairman Sanjay Kirloskar, before he left for a public rally.Engineering marvelTalking of the challenges and how they met it, Kirloskar director R K Shrivastava said that the system achieved engineering milestones in pumping largest volume of water up 71 m in five stages using innovation in design that had also brought them a US patent for the siphon duct. “The concrete pumps are high efficiency long life motors that have been constructed at the site. They use less power, translating into an annual saving of Rs 12.23 crore per annum,” Shrivastava said. At Rs 400 crore, the project has been accomplished at one-fourth the cost suggested by a foreign engineering firm in early 1990s.
