For the last 45 years the Indian government has waxed eloquent on the need to exploit the country's hydro potential. This has, however, remained a pipe dream as hydropower has been consistently on the decline (see table alongside).

On paper, India's potential for generating hydro-electricity is immense -estimated at 84,044 MW (at 60 per cent availability). This is based on the assessed exploitable hydro electric potential and it translates into annual energy generation of over 600 billion units.

The sad part is that only 21891.1 MW, just 26 per cent, was developed by the end of 1998. Even if the 6,000 MW, which is under development, is considered, a large portion of the potential remains under-exploited.

Up to the end of the third Five Year Plan (1961-66), hydropower capacity had an adequate share in the growth of the power sector. At that time, India's planners had recommended a hydro thermal mix of 40:60, which is the ideal ratio recommended by experts too. This norm, however, exists only on paper. As can be seen from the table the ratio has dipped to an alarming 25:73 (the balance is made up of nuclear power).

The barriers
There are two main reasons why the growth of hydel capacity has suffered. One is the large gestation period involved in building a hydel power plant. This, if seen from a purely commercial motive, should not be a problem. There are other industries, which have long gestation periods and still manage to come out with new projects. The problem here is the shortsightedness of India's politicians. When unsure of retaining power, they choose to commission thermal power plants, which have relatively shorter gestation periods.

The second reason, more pertinent in these times, is the human rights and environmental protection movement. With the steady increase in road networking over the years, more and more inaccessible areas have become populated. This poses a major problem as setting up a hydel power plant involves constructing a dam and inundation of large parts of plains as well as forests. This necessitates the rehabilitation of tribals staying in the parts that are inundated. Inundation of forests also means destruction of the rich fauna and flora.

With the increasing importance given to the environment, and the fact that a great deal of inconvenience is caused through inundation of land, hydel projects have become unpopular. Environmental as well as human rights movements like the Narmada Bacchao Andolan have successfully retarded their growth. The enormous hostility to the Sardar Sarovar project in Gujarat and the Silent Valley project in the south, is ample testimony to this fact.