As India Chases Net Zero, Should It Back Rivers Over Dams?

About 280 km south of Delhi, the village of Bhood Kheda in Rajasthan sits amidst red sandstone rocks, big-leafed dhok trees, grasslands and millet and paddy farms. On a nearby hillock stands an L-shaped earthen and rock embankment. It serves as the water conserving structure, locally known as ‘Kaachre Ka Tal’. Despite its name, this is a critical lifeline for the village, which lies in the dry Karauli district in Rajasthan. 

Bhood Kheda receives scant annual rainfall of just 60 mm. Its undulating landscape, ranging between 700 to 1,300 feet, allows rainwater to flow down the sides of the surrounding Aravalli hills, and collect in the artificial reservoir, instead of rushing away. 

The stored water recharges underground aquifers and, once full, spills gradually into the Sherni river. Similar structures, including 300 earthen dams, built along the 70-km river have helped revive the stretch that passes through 108 villages now largely free of water scarcity. In the Chambal ravines, some former bandits have reportedly taken up farming after water availability improved.

The rejuvenation of the Sherni has strengthened a long-running argument by environmentalists that rivers serve their best purpose when allowed to flow freely. This puts them in the crosshairs of development experts who advocate for drawing river water for flood control, water storage, power generation, irrigation and transportation.

As India strives to become net zero, the question is no longer whether rivers should be used, but how.

Dams and the old development model

Most rivers, especially in developing countries like India, are not left to their own will. Dams and barrages have obstructed rivers for various purposes. India has the highest dam construction rate in the world, totalling 5,701 (of which 447 are under construction) as of 2016. The subcontinent also hosts the most number of dams in the world after China (23,842) and the USA (9,261). 

In the previous century, hydroelectric dams were seen as the most practical route to prosperity, a cheap source of energy and irrigation. The assumption was that the produced energy will power industries and create jobs, while irrigation will help increase food production. 

But as the environmental and social costs of river projects were realised over time (along with their falling efficiency, and increasing risks of devastating floods by failure of ageing dams,) questions emerged about whether these practices should be discontinued. 

Even official thinking has begun to shift. A report by the Central Water Commission noted that amidst growing environmental and social concerns about large dams, alternative types of water storage, energy storage and nature-based solutions are emerging. River rejuvenation is one such approach because it improves water availability, reduces flood risk and revives green cover that serves as a carbon sink. 

When engineering weakens rivers

The costs are not limited to dams alone. Channelisation, embankments and dredging can also strip rivers of resilience. 

In Europe, for example, the issue was brought into focus after a massive fish kill that occurred in the Oder river in 2022. Scientists from the Leibniz Institute of Freshwater Ecology and Inland Fisheries (IGB) found that a toxic algal bloom, Prymnesium parvum, triggered the immediate crisis, but also said years of river engineering had reduced the river’s ability to cope with stress. 

“Acting as natural buffer systems in the river landscape, intact floodplains can mitigate flood waves, store water for dry periods and provide refuge for aquatic fauna. River engineering, embankment and artificial drainage of floodplains have drastically compromised these functions,” said IGB. 

Despite warnings from the IGB in 2020, planned development of the Oder in Poland continued even after the fish kills. Construction work and dredging were allowed as well despite low water levels. This development was funded by the World Bank, European Union and the Council of Europe Development Bank. Dredging stirred up nutrients and legacy contaminants (toxic, persistent) like mercury and other heavy metals from decades of industrial pollution, which exerted their toxic effects on the river ecosystem again. Anoxic sediments were also stirred up further reducing oxygen levels. The IGB said that it issued the warning against the development plans as Oder was one of the last, relatively large, near-natural rivers in Europe.      

The lesson was broader than one river: engineering often solves one problem while creating others.

The global reckoning on dams

By the 1970s, resistance to dams was growing worldwide. Demands began to be made to put their performance under scrutiny. The 1990s had seen conflicts and tensions across the world against dams whose reservoirs would submerge villages, flood indigenous territories, disrupt rural people’s livelihood and irreversibly modify riverine ecosystems. In a number of cases this led to a review of projects and even the withdrawal of the World Bank’s support, for example the Sardar Sarovar Dam on the Narmada. 

This resulted in the constitution of the World Commission of Dams (WCD) in 1997 by the World Bank, headed by the South African minister Kader Asmal. It was the first time that the performance of dams was audited and the WCD report, delivered three years later, was eye-opening. It said that although dams had made a significant contribution to human development, an “unacceptable and unnecessary” price had been paid to secure those benefits in social and environmental terms by displaced people, downstream communities, tax payers, and the natural environment. 

Negatives of dams raised by the WCD are: 

- Siltation that reduces the fresh water storage capacity of dams by 0.5-1% every year, 

      - Dams fragment and destroy riverine watershed ecosystems affecting fishes that provide a number of ecosystem services like nutrient recycling, water purification, soil replenishment and flood control besides being a protein source for one billion people. 

      - Between 1986 and 1993, more than four million people were displaced annually by construction starting on 300 large dams. In the case of India, the report had said that large dams displaced 77% of people displaced by all development projects. 

       - Emission of GHG methane from rotting vegetation in dams (though it could not give exact figures). 

The critique has only grown stronger. In 2023, a group of three NGOs — International Rivers, Rivers Without Borders, Friends of the Earth US — prepared a list of no-go areas for international banking institutions that included free-flowing rivers. The report outlined pressure indicators that assess river connectivity before approving finance for development projects on the rivers. It stressed not only the environmental impact of fragmentation of rivers, but also called for protection of cultural aspects. “Freshwater ecosystems are central to the cultural identity and way of life for many Indigenous Peoples and other local communities for centuries,” cited the paper. It also referred to the negative impact of dams on rivers in India saying that it has affected the livelihoods of 10 million fisherfolk. 

The report concluded that free flowing rivers were critical for safeguarding biodiversity, maintaining water supply, mitigating climate change and supporting local and indigenous communities. Free flowing rivers are critical freshwater ecosystems and are disappearing three times faster than forests, the report added. 

India’s Yamuna paradox

Few Indian rivers illustrate the limits of dam-led planning better than the Yamuna and its tributaries in the Himalayan region. There are as many as six large dams on the Yamuna and its tributary Tons in the upper reaches down to the foothills around Kalsi (famous for its Ashokan Rock Edict). In addition, there are two barrages within this first 158 km stretch of the river starting from the Bandarpunch Glacier. The Yamuna eventually joins the Ganga at Allahabad (Prayagraj) after traversing a total distance of 1,376 km. 

Apart from the dams that withdraw water for irrigation and drinking water, the place where a large share of the Yamuna’s water is diverted for irrigation is the Hathnikund Barrage. Beyond Hathnikund Barrage the river loses most of its natural flow. By the time the river reaches Delhi, the river is sustained largely by sewage and industrial waste. Yet three more large dams are being built in the hilly slopes on the Yamuna and two of its tributaries – the Tons and Giri. As recently as February 2026, the government of Uttarakhand ordered its electricity department to speed up the 300 MW Lakhwar Dam project on the Yamuna at a height of about 2,200 feet. Even the central government has been doing its bit to expedite the project on the promise that it would ensure the uninterrupted flow of the Yamuna at Delhi, Mathura and Vrindavan. 

It wasn’t exactly clear how the construction of a single additional dam could dramatically increase the water flow in the river, when six earlier dams and several barrages have been unable to do it, especially since Lakhwar Dam would also divert water to irrigate 40,000 hectares of land in Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh, said Bhim Singh Rawat of SANDRP. 

Water-sharing agreements signed in 1994 about the sharing of waters of the Yamuna between the riparian states — Uttar Pradesh 33%, Uttarakhand 12% (carved out from Uttar Pradesh in 2002), Haryana 47.82% and Delhi 6% — left little for the river itself. 

The Yamuna’s crisis reflects a deeper planning failure, which treats rivers as pipelines rather than living systems.

Ageing infrastructure, rising risk

The debate is no longer only about new dams. In 2021, the United Nations University Institute of Health and Environment (UNUIHE) put out a report flagging the dangers posed by ageing dams. It revealed that 32,716 or 55% of the world’s large dams (dams with a height of 15 metres and more) were located in four Asian countries – China, India, Japan and South Korea. 

According to the Central Water Commission (CWC), there have so far been 36 dam failures in India so far, though it does not give any details. It picked out the Machu Dam failure of 1979 in Gujarat as the worst dam failure disaster in which 2,000 people lost their lives.

This raises difficult choices. Should old dams be repaired, rebuilt, decommissioned or replaced with decentralised systems? The long-running dispute over Kerala’s 130-year-old Mullaperiyar dam, operated by Tamil Nadu, shows how politically charged such decisions can become.

The case of rejuvenation

River rejuvenation offers a different path. Instead of relying on giant structures that interrupt flows, it works with hydrology. In Rajasthan and Maharashtra, community-led water restoration has revived areas once classified as “dark zones” where groundwater had collapsed and extraction exceeded recharge.

Dr. Rajendra Singh of Tarun Bharat Sangh (TBS), often called the Waterman of India, says the principle is simple: make rainwater slow down long enough to soak into the land. Through check dams, earthen embankments and local water bodies, his organisation says it has helped rejuvenate more than 20 rivers across Rajasthan, Gujarat and Maharashtra.

“There is no displacement, destruction and disaster risk. Moisture is perineal, and long-term greenery acts as a mechanism of carbon sequestration,” said Dr. Singh, comparing the effectiveness of his methods with that of dams. He said that it was the result of work on the foothills of the Aravalli Range spread over four decades. His model of rejuvenation uses water conservation structures built in dry and hot areas to slow down the rain. “The rainwater running down the slopes of the Aravalli hills was first made to walk and then crawl so that groundwater was recharged and the connection between surface water and ground water was re-established,” explained his colleague Dr. Indira Singh. 

“As forests regenerate due to the presence of water, their trans evaporation attracts rain clouds and there is more rainfall. Rivers begin to flow and later become perineal while the sun no longer beats down on the ground because of the growing vegetation and clouds and temperatures are lowered,” she added. 

The resulting positives spilled over into local life, too. Due to the abundance of water, 68-year-old Bachhi Singh said he and his four brothers gave up banditry for peaceful farming. As of 2023, more than 1,500 people have quit crime, and are now engaged in water conservation activities and farming, according to TBS.

Due to water availability round the year, enough wheat, millets and maize and fodder now grow on their land to feed their families and cattle. Some surplus is left for the market as well. “Production of wheat and maize has increased ten-fold,” said Dr. Rajendra Singh. Water chestnut cultivation and pisciculture are the spinoffs that supplement farm incomes.

Who pays for the rejuvenation project? Villagers have to provide at least a third of the cost of building these dams, while TBS procures the rest from CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) budgets of private companies. “Commitment comes from a sense of participation as the villagers know that they have contributed to the creation of embankments and trust is built from the transparency in the use of funds. The Bhood Kheda dam, for example, cost ₹26 lakh of which the villagers’ contribution was ₹8.4 lakh,” said Dr. Singh. 

Rethinking net zero

Hydropower is often classified as clean energy because it does not rely on fossil fuel combustion. But climate policy is increasingly being judged on a wider set of outcomes, including biodiversity impacts, water security, displacement, methane emissions from reservoirs, sediment flows and disaster risk.

That does not mean all dams are redundant or that river restoration can replace every form of storage. Existing dams continue to play important roles in many regions, and some new projects may still be justified depending on local needs and safeguards.

What examples such as Bhood Kheda show, however, is that decentralised, nature-based water systems can also deliver climate resilience, groundwater recharge and livelihood gains, often with lower ecological and social costs.

As countries plan pathways to net zero, the policy challenge is not simply choosing between dams and rivers, but assessing which mix of solutions delivers the greatest long-term public benefit.