Old ‘kattas’ make a comebackas mini check dams

A revival: Dakshina Kannada Zilla Panchayat Chief Executive Officer M.R. Ravi at a site to build a check dam at Konalu village under Golithottu Gram Panchayat in Puttur taluk.

Once called “kattas” (mini check drams across streams) and commonly seen across the coastal belt, they gradually disappeared due to preference to borewells. However, now they are making a comeback in a new avatar across Dakshina Kannada.

Earlier, the mud-based “kattas” held groundwater in summer, helping farming activities.

Now, Dakshina Kannada Zilla Panchayat has begun constructing such cement-concrete based “kattas” with single or more vents under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA). Now, called check dams, the panchayat is serious in building them after the government declared two taluks, Bantwal and Mangaluru, as drought-hit for the first time.

M.R. Ravi, Chief Executive Officer of the panchayat, told

The Hindu that three such dams are being built now near Balepuni, Golithottu and Eshwaramangala.

“The panchayat has plans to build 1,000 mini check dams across the district in a year by next March-end,” he said. Mr. Ravi said that in addition to holding groundwater, those dams also supplied water for farming and livestock. “The groundwater in some areas of Belthangady has depleted up to 650 ft,” he said.

Mr. Ravi said that the dams would be built at a cost ranging between ₹ 2.32 lakh and ₹ 5 lakh. At least five such dams would be built in the jurisdiction of each gram panchayat. He has written to all members of the panchayat to identify places for dams and extend their cooperation in constructing them.

He said that maintaining large vented dams required funds. For example, the district had about 1,500 vented dams. Now, the panchayat required about ₹ 3 crore to repair and maintain 427 of them. The panchayat has written to the government about it. And, maintaining mini check dams is easy and there is a provision for it under MGNREGA.

According to the Department of Mines and Geology, the groundwater table in Mangaluru depleted to 12.95 m in 2016 from 10.70 m in 2012. In Bantwal, it was down to 9.24 m from 8.53 m.

The watertable in Belthangady went down to 8.67 m from 7.33 m, in Puttur to 7.11 m from 6.10 m and in Sullia to 10.11 m from 8.98 m during the same period. The department officials blamed overexploitation of groundwater by drilling borewells for the situation.