India on Thursday claimed the release of water from the dam on Gumti River, Tripura did not impact the flood situation in Bangladesh.
‘We have seen concerns being expressed in Bangladesh that the current situation of flood in districts on the eastern borders of Bangladesh has been caused by the opening of the Dumbur dam upstream of the Gumti River in Tripura. This is factually not correct,’ says a statement published by Indian external affairs ministry on its website.
‘We would like to point out that the catchment areas of Gumti river that flows through India and Bangladesh have witnessed heaviest rains of this year over the last few days,’ it reads.
‘The flood in Bangladesh is primarily due to waters from these large catchments downstream of the dam. The Dumbur dam is located quite far from the border – over 120 Km upstream of Bangladesh. It is a low height (about 30m) dam that generates power that feeds into a grid and from which Bangladesh also draws 40MW power from Tripura,’ the release adds.
Along the about 120 Km river course there are three water level observation sites at Amarpur, Sonamura and Sonamura 2.
‘Heavy rainfall has been continuing since August 21 in the whole of Tripura and adjoining districts of Bangladesh. In the event of heavy inflow, automatic releases have been observed,’ the release mentions.
The release also adds that Amarpur station is part of a bilateral protocol under which India provided data to Bangladesh upto 15:00 hrs on August 21, 2024.
‘At 18:00 hrs, due to flooding, there was a power outage leading to problems of communication. Still, we have tried to maintain communication through other means created for urgent transmission of data,’ the release adds.
The release mentions that India remains committed to resolving issues and mutual concerns in water resources and river water management through bilateral consultations and technical discussions.