Assam MP writes to PM Modi to demolish Lower Subansiri dam project

Guwahati: Assam MP Ajit Kumar Bhuyan has written a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, appealing to him to disband the Subansiri Lower Hydroelectric Power Project (SLHEP), citing concerns over the safety of the dam in the wake of a recent landslide at the site.

Bhuyan, in his letter, said that the dam has been built without taking into consideration the recommendations of experts and that the hilly soil of Arunachal is fragile and the dam site is very much earthquake-prone.

He also pointed out that the base of the dam was reduced by 09 meters without any public explanation.

MP Bhuyan further said that the landslide on 27 November 2023 blocked the only diversion tunnel working at that time, resulting in the downstream Subansiri drying up for a long period of about 16 hours. He said that this was enough to kill the entire aquatic life of the river for a long stretch.

Bhuyan said that the fragile soil structure can never withstand the huge reservoir of water and that this unavoidable fact was ignored by the experts.

He expressed apprehension that a disaster at the dam site, many folds more destructive than the recently witnessed Sikkim disaster, is only a matter of time.

The Rajya Sabha MP, who is also a veteran journalist, reminded the Prime Minister that he had voiced his opposition to such big dams during the 2014 election campaign in Assam and that the present Defence Minister, Rajnath Singh, had gone a step further and campaigned that BJP would scrap the project if voted to power.

Bhuyan said that it is really unfortunate for the people of Assam that the National Green Tribunal (NGT) ignored the earlier decisions of the Kolkata Bench and that the Supreme Court Justice, who upheld the NGT verdict, became the chairman of Human Rights Commission immediately after retirement.

He said that the people of Assam refuse to believe that these developments were incidental.

Bhuyan said that the huge dam in Arunachal has been thrust upon the people living in the downstream in Assam and that the knowledge of the Assamese professors was bulldozed by the experts who toed the bureaucratic line of thinking to generate power at any cost.

He said that a thorough investigation will also reveal why the cost has escalated three times to about twenty thousand in as many years.

Bhuyan said that the dam, till it survives, will also remain an epitome of corruption at different levels.

He earnestly appealed to the Prime Minister to disband the project even now, saying that it has been constructed on incorrect basis of science and technology and that the lives of the Assamese matter and value much more than twenty thousand crores.

He said that the dam issue has engaged him over the years and that he had communicated on the issue with the concerned department of the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change in the recent past.

The MP said that the impending disaster will not spare those responsible for it.