Abrupt fall in the water level of Brahmaputra baffles the public

Fall in water level leads IWT to shift parghats

STAFF REPORTER

GUWAHATI: The Brahmaputra and its tributaries were in spate till September this year. However, the water level of the mighty river has come down so abruptly that the ferry services between Guwahati and North Guwahati had to be suspended today. The situation has come to such a pass that many sars have come up early at many stretches of the Brahmaputra.

In September, people going to the bank of the Brahmaputra in Guwahati saw the river overflowing. However, the situation is quite different now. The water level has come down all of a sudden, baring many sars.

When The Sentinel contacted Inland Water Transport (IWT) regarding the suspension of ferry services between Guwahati and North Guwahati today, a senior official said, “The abrupt fall in the water level of the Brahmaputra in the past few days has laid the parghats bare. The vessels cannot reach the existing parghats for operation. This has led us to shift the parghats to make ferry services operational. We need to erect jetties to help commuters reach the vessels. If everything goes as planned, we hope to resume ferry services tomorrow. We are busy shifting parghats and erecting jetties.”

The official further said, “We have witnessed a drastic fall in the water level of the Brahmaputra in Guwahati. We have noticed a fall of about three feet in the water level of the mighty river in the past few days. Such a situation usually occurs at the end of November.”

When asked, an official engaged in the construction of the six-lane bridge under construction over the Brahmaputra connecting Guwahati and North Guwahati said, “We have been working for the past three years. We have never witnessed such a drastic fall in the water level of this river in October”.

When The Sentinel contacted CWC (Central Water Commission) officials in Guwahati, they provided data that showed a drastic decrease in the water level of the river. According to the CWC, the water level of the Brahmaputra in Guwahati read 44.65 metres this morning. It came down to 44.56 metres in the evening today. On October 15, 2023, the water level of the Brahmaputra was 47.14 metres.

According to the CWC, the water levels of the Brahmaputra this evening were 103.43 metres in Dibrugarh, 82.67 metres at Neamatighat in the Jorhat district, 61.69 metres in Tezpur in the Sonitpur district, 32.01 metres in Goalpara, and 25.72 metres in Dhubri.

The situation augurs well for the government and hydrologists to do serious research on the abrupt fall in the water of the Brahmaputra.

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