Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: The Nawaz Sharif-led federal government has delisted Diamer Bhasha dam from its priority and has shifted its funds to other hydel power projects, it has been revealed in government documents available with Daily Times.

Diamer Bhasha dam project was the idea of former President Musharraf but construction of this project had started during the PPP government to exclusively address energy and irrigation needs of the country. However, even as a decade passes, no progress on the issue has been made.

The Water and Power ministry classified documents reveal that the federal government obtained Rs 5.4 billion fund in 2015 from Diamer Bhasha dam project and allegedly transferred this huge amount to Neelam Jhelum Hydro power project.

Diamer Bhasha dam will be constructed at a cost of $14 billion and the Agha Khan foundation is likely to finance this project. With the construction of this project, energy-starved Pakistan will be able to generate 4,500 MegaWatts of electricity from this project as the completion date of this project has been proposed to be around 2020.

A well placed source privy to this development revealed that the GB government also protested with the federal government over transferring of this fund from Bhasha to NJHPC and termed this action against the interests of the northern people.

The document says that General Manager Finance WAPDA had released these Rs 5,400 million to NJHPC with the consent of planning and development division government of Pakistan. A senior officer of Water and Power ministry said on condition of anonymity that imprudent utilisation of Bhasha dam suggested that the federal government had decided to shelve this project as now the ministry had started focusing on gas and coal power plants that are also hazardous to the environment.

The source revealed that the federal government was already in the process of giving final touches to the purchase of the land and huge irregularities had already been unearthed in this transaction. The dam will have a height of 272 meters spillway with fourteen gates each 11.5 m x 16.24 m. The gross capacity of the reservoir will be 8,100,000 acre feet (10.0 km3), with a live storage of 6,400,000 acre feet (7.9 km3). Two underground powerhouses are being proposed, one on each side of the main dam having six turbines on each side with a total installed capacity of 4500 MW.