Syllabus: Definition - Irrigation and Irrigation Engineering, advantages of irrigation, ill-

effects of over irrigation, types of irrigation project - purpose wise and administrative wise

Definition of IRRIGATION & IRRIGATION ENGINEERING

Irrigation may be defined as the process of supplying water to plants for its growth
and maturity in a scientific way. It is the artificial means of application of water to soil
with a view to fulfil the following objectives:
1. Ensure enough moisture essential for plant life;
2. Provide crop insurance against short duration drought;
3. Cool the soil and atmosphere to provide a congenial (comfortable) atmosphere for
plant growth;
4. Wash out or dilute harmful salts in the soil;
5. Reduce hazards of soil piping;
6. Soften the tillage pans (i.e., cultivated lands).
Irrigation Engineering: It is the engineering of controlling and harnessing the various
natural sources of water, by the construction of dams and reservoirs, canals and
headworks, and finally distributing the water to the agricultural fields.

The necessity of irrigation may be summarised as under:

1. Deficient rainfall and development of Agriculture in Desert area: When the total rainfall is less than
needed for the crop, artificial supply is necessary.

Rainfall (cm) Irrigation Requirement

Less than 100 cm Rainfall needs to be supplemented by irrigation
Rainfall is helpful to crops but is insufficient. Irrigation is
100 – 50
essential.
Only inferior crops such as, Jowar, Bajra, etc. can be grown.
50 – 25
Irrigation is essentially required.
Less than 25 cm No crop can be grown without irrigation.

2. Non-uniformity of rainfall: Where rainfall is sufficient but is not uniform, concentrated as it usually
is in monsoon months, there is acute requirement of irrigation in other periods. The rainfall during the winter
is very scanty, and hence Rabi crops need artificial supply of water through the irrigation works.
3. Augmentation of crop yields, especially for Perennial Crops: New high yielding varieties of crops
have higher water requirements for giving higher yields. Sugarcane and rice have higher requirement of water.
4. Commercial crops with additional water: The rainfall in particular area may be sufficient to raise the
usual crops, but more water may be necessary for raising commercial and cash crops.
5. Controlled water supply: By the construction of proper distribution system, the yield of the crop may
be increased.
 Advantages of irrigation can be direct as well as indirect.
I. Direct Benefits:
1. Increase in food output through higher yield.
2. Cultivation of cash crops.
3. Growing of fruit trees and development of gardens or orchards.
4. Protection from famine.
5. Prevention of damage through floods.
6. Domestic water supply to towns and villages.
7. Hydel power generation at dam site and canal falls.
8. Means of communication where navigation is possible in the canal.
9. Revenue from recreation facilities such as boating, fishing and swimming.
10. Fish and wildlife preservation.
11. Afforestation.

II. Indirect Benefits:

1. Increase in gross domestic product of the country.
2. Increase in revenue from sales tax on food-grains.
3. Increase in employment.
4. Improvement in groundwater storage.
5. Increase in value of land property.
6. General development of country and communication: The inspection road along the canal
banks may serve as a communication link with the otherwise remote village.

Uncontrolled and wasteful use of irrigation water can lead to:

(i) Water-logging
(ii) Salinity and alkalinity of land (due to rise of water table as a result of excessive seepage
of water through the bed and banks of the canals)
(iii) Loss of manure
(iv) Loss of precious water, which is developed, preserved and distributed by investing an
enormous amount of public fund.
Other ill-effects (due to inadequate drainage facilities and over irrigation) are as follows:
(a) Unhealthy climate: Due to intense irrigation the climate becomes colder and damper. This
leads to unhealthy conditions.
(b) Malarial condition: When water is not properly used, water stagnates and creates places
of mosquito breeding and malarial infection.
Also due to irrigation, valuable residential and industrial land is wasted for constructing
irrigation canals and storage reservoirs for barrages or dams.

Classification of Irrigation Projects

Irrigation projects are classified in different ways, however, in Indian context it is usually
classified as follows:
1. Classification Based on Purpose Served:
(i) Single Purpose Irrigation Project: A single purpose irrigation project, as the name implies, is meant
for a particular purpose i.e., irrigation. The pre-independence irrigation projects were mostly single
purpose, but the necessity to derive the maximum benefits from the surface water resources
inevitably led to the concept of multipurpose projects.
(ii) Multipurpose Irrigation Project: It is a project which is constructed for two or more purposes such
as irrigation, flood control, power generation, navigation, domestic and industrial water supply, etc.
2. Classification Based on Administrative Convenience:
• Major project: This type of project consists of huge surface water, storage reservoirs
and flow diversion structures. The area envisaged to be covered under
irrigation is of the order over 10000 hectare.

• Medium project: These are also surface water projects but with medium size storage and
diversion structures with the area under irrigation between 10000
hectare and 2000 hectare.

• Minor project: The area proposed under irrigation for these schemes is below 2000 Ha
(hectare) and the source of water is either ground water or from wells or
tube wells or surface water lifted by pumps or by gravity flow from tanks.
It could also be irrigated from through water from tanks.

So, it is clear that Minor irrigation projects have both surface and ground water as their
source, while Major and Medium projects mostly exploit surface water resources.
The major and medium irrigation projects are further classified as (i) Direct irrigation
method; (ii) Storage irrigation method.
Direct and Indirect (or Storage) Irrigation Methods
The major and medium surface water schemes are usually classified as either direct or
indirect irrigation projects and these are defined as follows:
1. Direct Irrigation method
In this project water is directly diverted from the river into the canal by constructing a
diversion structure like weir or barrage across the river with some pondage to take care of
diurnal variations. It also effects in raising the river water level which is then able to flow into the
off-taking channel by gravity. The flow in the channel is usually controlled by a gated structure
and this in combination with the diversion structure is also sometimes called the headworks.
If the water from such headworks is available throughout the period of growth of crops irrigated
by it, it is called a perennial irrigation scheme. In this type of projects, the water in the off-taking
channels from the river carries water throughout the year. It may not be necessary, however, to
provide irrigation water to the fields during monsoon. In some places local rainfall would be
sufficient to meet the plant water needs. In case of a non-perennial river the off-taking channel
would be carrying water only for certain period in a year depending upon the availability of supply
from the source.

Fig. 1: An Example of a Direct Irrigation Scheme

Another form of direct irrigation is the inundation irrigation which may be called river-canal
irrigation. In this type of irrigation there is no irrigation work across the river to control the level of
water in the river. Inundation canal off-taking from a river is a seasonal canal which conveys water
as and when available in the river. This type of direct irrigation is usually practiced in deltaic tract
that is, in areas having even and plane topography. It is feasible when the normal flow of river or stream
throughout the period of growth of crop irrigated, is never less than the requirements of the irrigated crops
at any time of the base period. A direct irrigation scheme of irrigation using river water diversion head
works typically be laid out as in Figure 1. An example of this scheme is the DVC irrigation project on
the Damodar River with the barrage located at Durgapur.
2. Storage Irrigation Method
For this type of irrigation schemes part of the excess water of a river during monsoon
which otherwise would have passed down the river as a flood is stored in a reservoir or
tank found at the upstream of a dam constructed across a river or stream. This stored
water is then used for irrigation.
This method is adopted when the flow of river or stream is in excess of the
requirements of irrigated crops during a certain part of the year but falls below
requirements or is not available at all in the river during remaining part of the year. Since
the construction site of a storage reservoir is possible in regions of undulating topography, it is
usually practiced in non-deltaic areas. A general layout of this irrigation scheme may typically be
laid out as shown in Figure 2.

Fig. 2: A Typical Layout for a Storage Irrigation Scheme incorporating a Dam

An example for this type of scheme is the Indira Sagar project on the Narmada River. Of course,
apart from serving irrigation demand, the project also generates electricity. Hence it is actually a
multi-purpose project.

Another type of storage irrigation method envisages the storage of water at some place in the
hilly terrain of the river where the construction of the dam is possible. A barrage is constructed at
some downstream location, where the terrain is flatter and canals take off as in a usual direct
irrigation method. A general layout of such scheme could be represented as in Figure 3. An example
for this type of scheme is the Bhakra-dam Nangal-barrage combination on the river Sutlej.
 Fig. 3: A Typical Layout for a Storage Irrigation Scheme incorporating a Dam with a
Barrage on its downstream

Prepared by DR. MONINDRA NATH PATRA, Senior-most Faculty in CE, BPCIT, Krishnagar,
Nadia & Former Officer-in-Charge, SRSV, Suri, Birbhum

Bibliography
1. Dr. M. N. Patra: “A Complete Text Book of Irrigation Engineering”, Lakshmi Prakashani,
Kolkata, 2019
2. Majumdar, S.K.: “Irrigation Engineering”, Tata McGraw-Hill Publishing Co. Ltd., New Delhi,
1993
3. Sharma, R.K. & T.K. Sharma: “Irrigation Engineering”, S. Chand & Co. Ltd., New Delhi, 2013
4. Varshney, R.S., S.G. Gupta and R.L. Gupta, “Theory and Design of Irrigation Structures”
(Volume I), Nem Chand & Bros., Roorkee (U.P.), Seventh Edition, 2000.
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Delhi, Second Edition, 2013 (2nd Reprint).
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9. https:// nptel.ac.in/courses
10. Many other internet resources.