Mayurakshi River

Floods and their control

Many of the rivers that originate on the Chota Nagpur Plateau, including the Mayurakshi, and flow down into West Bengal are rain fed and have for ages wrought havoc with their seasonal floods. Annual rainfall over the basin varies between 765 and with an average of 1200 mm of which 80 percent occurs during the monsoon season from June to September.

Some of the historically important floods in this river were recorded by L.S.S. O'Malley in the Bengal District Gazetteers for the districts of Murshidabad and Birbhum. For the district of Birbhum, O'Malley has noted "in 1787 there was a high flood which it is said, in some places swept off villages, inhabitants and cattle, the crops on the ground, with everything that was moveable." O'Malley also recorded that "in 1806 the Mayurakshi and Ajay had a sudden extraordinary rise and floods washed away whole villages." In September 1902, because of heavy rains the Brahmani and the Mayurakshi overflowed their banks and inundated the surrounding country in some places to the depth of 12 to {{cite web |access-date=2007-02-19 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060716120910/http://www.unescap.org/enrd/water_mineral/disaster/Flood%20and%20role%20of%20people.doc |archive-date=2006-07-16

Massanjore Dam

From the counterpart rupee fund created through supplies of wheat and other materials from Canada for use in India, Canada devoted those rupees to the further development of the Mayurakshi dam project.{{cite web | access-date = 2007-02-19

Tilpara Barrage

Apart from the Massanjore Dam there is a barrage, some 32 km downstream, at Tilpara, near Suri. The barrage is 1013 ft long and had cost Rs. 1.11 crore.

Since 1960

In the four decades between 1960 and 2000 only five years could be identified as flood-free years, when only less than 500 km2 of area were inundated. After major floods in 1978, West Bengal suffered consecutively in 1998, 1999 and 2000. In 1978, seventy two hours of continuous and concentrated rainfall over the western river basin areas of the Bhagirathi viz. from the Pagla-Bansloi to the Ajay, generated so huge flood volume that all embankments on the eastern side of the Bhagirathi were almost washed away and the whole of Nadia district, a larger part of Murshidabad district and northern areas of North 24 Parganas district were flooded and remained underwater for a long time.{{cite web | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20070929120052/http://www.thestatesman.net/page.arcview.php?clid=6&id=158584&usrsess=1 | url-status = dead | archive-date = 2007-09-29 | access-date = 2007-02-19 | archive-url =https://web.archive.org/web/20070929120401/http://www.thestatesman.net/page.arcview.php?clid=23&id=76801&usrsess=1 | url-status =dead | archive-date =2007-09-29 | access-date = 2007-02-19

Irrigation and power

Massanjore dam has ensured irrigation of some 600000 acre of land with an estimated resultant increased yield of approximately 400,000 tons of food annually {{cite web |access-date = 2007-02-19 |access-date=2007-02-19 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070206062442/http://www.wb.nic.in/dist/birbhum.html |archive-date=2007-02-06

Tributaries

The Mayurakshi is fed by tributaries Brahmani, Dwaraka, Bakreshwar and Kopai.

References

References

1. Selim. Mohammad, ''Irrigation Projects in Birbhum District'', published in ''Paschim Banga'', February 2006, {{in lang. bn, Birbhum special issue, Govt. of West Bengal, p 168-169
2. "About the Region".
3. "Rivers". West Bengal Tourism.