Dr Khiren Roy - Journalist Writer India

“ The protestors demand immediate halt in construction of the bridge, unless an environmental impact assessment study for the Bogibeel bridge is carried out by expertise.“

The Indian Railway Ministry may set the year 2008-2009 as the target for the completion of the Bogibeel road cum rail bridge on the mighty river Brahmaputra in eastern Asom, but the ground reality narrates a strong resentment against the project with the adopted design and lay out.

The fourth bridge on Luit (as Brahmaputra is known among Asomiya people) is a long standing demand of the people in the region, which has been projected to benefit the entire region economically. The bridge, to be the longest on Brahmaputra (in India) found its mention in the historic Assam Accord that culminated Asom Andolan (agitation) led by the state students’ body in late Eighties.

The initiation of work was inaugurated by the then Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee on April 21, 2002. The Indian Railways, which has been endowed the responsibility of construction of the bridge had already allocated Rs 60 crore for the Bogibeel bridge under National Rail Vikas Yojana (NRVJ). The construction of the Bogibeel road cum rail bridge (with the anticipated cost of Rs 1,767 crore) is however yet to speed up.

One can see no more than few beds for pillars with heaps of sand bags in the riverbank and parts of embankments even after four years of contraction period. More over, there are annual floods in Brahmaputra to wash away many portions of the constructed pillars and duke in the river bank. The recent debate that gains public domain that the proposed length of the bridge is not justified in comparison to the breath of Brahmaputra at the location and it would invite disaster throughout upper Asom in near future.

It may be mentioned that the proposed length of the bridge is only 4.3 km, where as the Brahmaputra maintains its width up to 7 km even in winter season. During summer the breadth of Brahmaputra goes up to 11 km. The concern has been raised that the disturbance of natural flow of Luit (by restricting the river flow areas almost up to one third of its optimum width) would only escalate the havoc of flood and erosion in both the banks of the river Brahmaputra and its tributaries.

More over, serious concerns are raised about the impact of the bridge on Majuli, the biggest river island on Earth and also the Vaishnavite cultural center, which is nearly 100 km downstream of the bridge. It is apprehended that the escalation of erosion would only help vanishing the island, as the past record narrates that Majuli had already been shrunk to 875 sq km from 1246 sq km in 1950.

The proposed bridge will be fourth attempt to connect the southern valley of the mighty river to the northern valley after Saraighat rail cum road bridge at Guwahati (commissioned in 1962 with main bridge length of 1.296 km), Kalia Bhomora road bridge at Tezpur (commissioned in 1987 with main bridge length of 3.015 km) and Naranarayana Setu rail cum road bridge at Jogighopa (commissioned in 1998 with main bridge length of 2.285 km).

The Bogibeel road cum rail bridge will connect the National Highway (NH) 37 on the south bank to the NH 52 on north bank of Brahmaputra. The rail track on south will be connected to Chaulkhowa station near Dibrugarh town and it will join the MG railway track on the north bank, which is connected to Rangiya junction. The MG track in northern bank (from Rangiya to Sisi Borgaon) is also planned to convert into BG very soon.

Recently, a memorandum has been sent to Dr APJ Abdul Kalam, the President of India seeking his intervention on the construction of the bridge with the proposed length, arguing that it would impose vulnerability to the life and livelihoods of 5,00,000 population in upper Asom including the world famous river island Majuli. The memorandum, signed by the eminent Asomiya scholar Dr. Hiren Gohain, community leaders Dr. Ranoj Pegu, Rabindra Nath, Johan Doley, Akhil Gogoi with a number of journalists including Kanaksen Deka (editor, Dainik Agradoot), Ajit Bhuyan (editor, Aji), Manoj Kr. Goswami (editor, Dainik Janasadharan), Dr. Nagen Saikia (editor, Amar Asom), Dr. Khiren Roy (editor, Asomiya Khabar), Nitya Borah (columnist), Manjit Mahanta (executive editor, Asomiya Pratidin), Prakash Mahanta (secretary, Journalists’ Action Committee) etc, expresses concern at the emerging threat hanging over the heads of the huge chunk of indigenous population inhabiting of the region.

“The 2,900 km river Brahmaputra, according to a study carried out by the UNESCO under its International Hydrological Decade Programme is ranked fourth amongst the rivers in the globe in respect of maximum flood discharges. The Brahmaputra that originates in Tibet and culminates in the Bay of Bengal after entering Bangladesh is also a major sediment transporting rivers on Earth. Its annual sediment load is estimated to be about 397 million ton with a flow of 477 billion cubic metre during 1978-2003 at Pancharatna in western Asom. It has the highest sediment yield next to the Yellow River in China. Its tributaries also carry high sediment load, which is normally more than 1,000 ton per square kilometer per year.

The design of the bridge shows its length as 4315.20 Metre and it would be supported by 41 numbers of pillars. The breath of Brahmaputra at the construction site (from extreme north bank to extreme south bank) is 11 km during monsoon and 7 Km during the lean period (winter). It shows that during the monsoon period, the river will be restricted to almost 1/3 of its total breadth. Now serious concern has been raised by the experts including senior officials under the state Water Resource Department that disturbing the natural flow of Brahmaputra to that much extent would trigger havoc in terms of flood on the upstream of the bridge and rigorous erosion due to flaring up affect in the downstream,” said in the memorandum.

The protestors demand immediate halt in construction of the bridge, unless an environmental impact assessment (including hydraulic modeling) study for the Bogibeel bridge is carried out by expertise. More over, they insist on ensuring people’s participation and transparency in the process. At the same time, it is also demanded that the findings of the assessment study along with the environmental management plan for mitigating the adverse impact are made public at the earliest.—SAN-Feature Service

–SAN-Feature Service