The Chhattisgarh Government has approved Rs3.77 crores for implementing the Kusumtola Reservoir project in Dondi Development Block of Balod district.
The project once completed would help irrigate 150 acres of land.
Moreover, the Government has also devise a special action plan for promoting Pisciculture through ‘cage culture' within an irrigation reservoir or Anicut built in an area of more than 200 hectares in the State.
The guidelines concerning the plan were released by the Fisheries Department recently.
As per the department officials, the lease for the developing the reservoirs into cage culture will soon be started. Notably, Chhattisgarh ranks among the leading States for fish breeding through cage culture, officials stated.
In the present scenario, cage culture through Pisciculture is done at Ghumka, Saroda, Chirpani, Ghonga and Torenga reservoirs.
Reservoirs managed by associations like Fishermen’s Committee functioning under the Fisheries Department who have been granted a lease for a longer tenure would receive a lease for a maximum area of two hectares.
A lease holder presently managing a reservoir can further promote cage culture. He or she has to pay a separate amount to the Department for setting up the cage. lease holders not keen towards cage culture can allow the interested fishermen within the framed rules of the Government.
The lease amount for putting up the cage is Rs100 per square meter of the reservoir. After a span of every two years, the amount per square meter will be increased by Rs10.
Interested fishermen will have to obtain a ‘No Objection Certificate’ (NOC) from the Irrigation Department for beginning cage culture at the reservoirs. Meanwhile, the lease holder of the reservoir will not receive any kind of funds on behalf of the state Government.
However, the Government has provided an option to the fishermen of purchasing seeds for cage culture from private parties if the same is unavailable at the departmental level.
Also, the Government has decided to host workshops on cage culture on regular basis.
Meanwhile, the water-level in the irrigation reservoirs has improved considerably due to the recent rainfall in the entire State as on September 18 this year, officials stated.
The water-level in the 42 major and minor water reservoirs was 64.37 per cent.
The Mongara Barrage (Rajnandgaon), Kedar Nala and Putka Nala Reservoir (both Raigarh) was filled up to full capacity.
According to the State Data Centre of the Water Resources Department available as on September 18, the water level at the Kumhari Reservoir in Raipur district was the lowest.
The water-level was only 15 per cent of the total capacity in the reservoir.
The Union Ministry of Water Resources had released the storage status of 91 major reservoirs of the country as on September 17, 2015.
As per the information, the Central region includes States of Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh. There are 12 reservoirs under CWC monitoring having total storage capacity of 42.30BCM. The total storage available in these reservoirs is 32.34 BCM which is 76% of total storage capacity of these reservoirs.
The storage during corresponding period of last year was 84% and average storage of last ten years during corresponding period was 67% of storage capacity of these reservoirs. Thus, storage during current year is less than the storage of last year but is better than the average storage of last ten years..
The Ministry further observed: ‘ States having better storage than last year for corresponding period are Himachal Pradesh and Tripura. States having lesser storage than last year for corresponding period are Punjab, Rajasthan, Jharkhand, Odisha, West Bengal, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, (Two combined project in both states) Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu.’