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| Govt may relax norms for irrigation projects | |
| Press Trust Of India / New Delhi November 21, 2008, 0:31 IST | |
In an effort to ensure that maximum number of farmers are able to utilise irrigation facilities, the government is planning to relax norms for approving centrally-sponsored irrigation projects for certain categories of states, according to sources.
Under the centrally-sponsored Command Area Development and Water Management Programme (CADWM), any new project from states can be included in the scheme only after satisfactory completion of the ongoing project. But the Centre is planning to relax the condition for projects to be included in the prime minister’s package for agrarian distress projects.
Those benefitting from this scheme are drought-prone districts, tribal areas and the special category states, which include Northeastern states, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, and the Kalahandi-Bolangir-Koraput (KBK) districts of Orissa.
“The government plans to relax the norms during the remaining period of the XIth Five Year Plan (2007-2012),” sources in the water resources ministry said here.
CADWM was initially launched in 1974 as the Command Area Development (CAD) programme for development of adequate delivery system to provide irrigation water up to farmers’ fields to enhance water-use efficiency and productivity of crops per unit of land. The programme was restructured and renamed as Command Area Development and Water Management (CADWM) programme in April, 2004.
At present, 138 irrigation projects are receiving central assistance under CADWM. Since its inception till March, 2008, the Centre has released assistance to the tune of Rs 3528.08 crore to various states.
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