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The Chief Ministers of Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Delhi and Haryana signed the Kishau Multipurpose Project agreement, in the presence of Union Home Minister and Minister of Cooperation Amit Shah and Union Jal Shakti Minister C. R. Patil.
A 232.6-metre-high concrete gravity dam will be built on the Tons River, which flows along the Uttarakhand-Himachal Pradesh border, with a storage capacity of 1,562 million cubic metres.
The project has been declared a National Project: the Government of India will bear about 90% of the financial burden and the partner states the remaining 10%, in line with the 1994 basin agreement.
It will irrigate 97,000 hectares and generate 1,476 million units of clean hydropower, with Delhi named the biggest beneficiary.
The Government described it as the tenth inter-state water dispute settled since 2018, and said the agreement frees water for the Yamuna's environmental flow.
Storage on the Yamuna for the six basin states — the first of the Upper Yamuna disputes settled, by an MoU of 28 August 2018
Key: 204 m concrete dam near Lohari village, Dehradun district, Uttarakhand; live storage 330.66 MCM; 300 MW; cost about Rs 3,966.51 crore, with 90% central funding of the water component
Storage on the Giri River to supply Delhi and other basin states — MoU signed 11 January 2019
Key: 148 m dam in Sirmaur district, Himachal Pradesh; reservoir about 498 MCM; supplies 23 cumecs; 40 MW at peak flow; foundation stone laid in December 2021
Harness Ravi waters downstream of the Ranjit Sagar Dam — dispute settled in August 2018
Key: 55.5 m concrete gravity dam in Pathankot district, Punjab; declared a national project in 2008; 206 MW; irrigates about 5,000 ha in Punjab and over 32,000 ha in Jammu and Kashmir
Transfer surplus Ken water in Madhya Pradesh to the Betwa in Uttar Pradesh for drought-prone Bundelkhand; the two states agreed in 2021
Key: Approved by the Union Cabinet in December 2021 at Rs 44,605 crore; 77 m Daudhan dam inside Panna Tiger Reserve and a canal of about 230 km
Give nationally important major irrigation and multipurpose projects a far higher share of central assistance
Key: Central funding of 90% of the water component; Lakhwar and Renukaji are both funded on these terms, and Kishau has now been given the same status
Regulates the allocation of available Yamuna flows among the beneficiary states up to and including the Okhla barrage, monitors return flows and water quality, maintains basin hydro-meteorological data and reviews project progress. Constituted by a Government of India resolution dated 11 March 1995, following the 12 May 1994 MoU — an executive body, not a tribunal.
The Centre's technical organisation for water resources — scheme appraisal, flood forecasting, dam safety and inter-state water data. Created in 1945 as the Central Waterways, Irrigation and Navigation Commission on the advice of Dr B. R. Ambedkar, then Member (Labour) in the Viceroy's Executive Council.
Empowers Parliament to provide by law for the adjudication of disputes over the use, distribution or control of inter-state river waters, and to bar the jurisdiction of any court — including the Supreme Court — in such a dispute.
Enacted under Article 262; provides for a tribunal to adjudicate a dispute a state refers to the Centre. The 2019 amendment sought to fix a maximum of four and a half years for adjudication and to make a bench's decision final and binding on the states.
The Upper Yamuna basin agreement on sharing waters up to and including the Okhla barrage. It required a separate agreement for every storage project in the basin — which is why Lakhwar, Renukaji and now Kishau each needed one — and it sets the 10% state share in project cost.
Yamuna basin MoU signed; a separate agreement made necessary for each storage project
Upper Yamuna River Board constituted by government resolution
Lakhwar Multipurpose Project MoU signed by six basin states
Shahpur Kandi Dam Project dispute settled
Renukaji Multipurpose Dam Project MoU signed
Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh agree on the Ken-Betwa Link Project for Bundelkhand
Scheme approved to transfer water from Hathinikund to the Yamuna through an underground pipeline
Revised Parbati-Kalisindh-Chambal river link taken forward
Narmada Project rehabilitation dispute resolved; Bihar-Jharkhand sharing in the Son basin settled
Formal agreement reached on the Kishau Multipurpose Project
Six Chief Ministers sign the Kishau agreement — described as the tenth water dispute resolved since 2018
A gravity dam holds back its reservoir by sheer weight. It is a solid concrete wall, thickest at the base, that transfers the water load straight into the foundation rock. It needs sound rock and large volumes of concrete, but no arch action or buttressing.
Simple Analogy: A doorstop holds a door by mass alone, not by being anchored.
The Tons rises in the Bandarpunch region of the Himalaya and forms at Netwar, where the Rupin — which arises in Himachal Pradesh — joins the Supin. It drains the Jaunsar-Bawar region of western Uttarakhand and meets the Yamuna near Kalsi, about 48 km from Dehradun, carrying more water than the Yamuna at the confluence. The Yamuna itself joins the Ganga at Prayagraj.
The Union Home Minister said the Yamuna's environmental flow was never calculated when its waters were allocated, leaving nothing for the river itself — the classic case study for why e-flow is now written into river basin planning.
The release credits Zonal Council meetings with laying the groundwork for these settlements and names the Inter-State Council as a body that was activated — the co-operative federalism machinery, as against the adjudicatory route of a tribunal.
Ken-Betwa and Parbati-Kalisindh-Chambal belong to the National Perspective Plan's link programme, while Kishau, Lakhwar and Renukaji are storage projects within one basin — a distinction exams test.
GS Paper 2 > Polity and Governance > Federalism and Inter-State Relations; GS Paper 1 > Geography > Drainage
General Awareness > Indian Geography > Rivers and Dams
General Awareness > Current Affairs > National Projects
A dam that resists reservoir pressure through its own weight, widest at the base and founded on sound rock.
Status given by the Ministry of Jal Shakti to nationally important major irrigation or multipurpose projects, carrying central assistance of 90% of the water component.
The quantity and timing of flow a river must retain to sustain its ecology — omitted when the Yamuna's waters were first allocated among states.
One cubic metre of water per second — the unit used for the 23 cumecs Renukaji is to supply.