The water flow of the Teesta River marked a fall again yesterday after a dramatic increase on Tuesday.
According to Bangladesh Water Development Board, the river flow was recorded at 1242 cubic feet per second (Cusec) at Dalia point near Teesta Barrage located in Lalmonirhat district yesterday while it surprisingly stood at 3006 Cusec on the previous day.
On a query about the unprecedented decrease just after one day, Mir Sajjad Hossain, a member of Joint River Commission (JRC), could not give any satisfactory answer.
However, he said earlier water flow increased due to releasing more water by Indian government on the face of the continuous diplomatic pressure and swelling ice melting in the Himalayans.
Wishing anonymity, a former member of JRC told the Dhaka Tribune that such sort of ups and downs of water flow has been happening as per India’s whim.
“This is not the proper time of ice melting, which can create such kind of huge flow like Tuesday,” he added.
The water flow of the Teesta River dropped a record low which was only 409 cusec on March 9 this year as India allegedly withdrew water unilaterally by Gajoldoba barrage to move water to its expanded projects.
The regular water flow during the month of April is around 3,000 Cusec after introducing the Gajoldoba barrage located upstream of the river in India while the historical natural flow of the river during this period was around 6,000 Cusec, said Water Development Board sources.
The remarkable water flow (around 500 Cusec) decrease this year has turned the farmers of the Northern districts vulnerable, who are vastly dependent on Teesta Irrigation Project which required at least 2,000 Cusec of water.
