Ever since the dawn of civilization, rivers have played a significant role in being the cradles of civilization and the story of man is entwined with the saga of the rivers. Be it the fertile plains of the Tigris and the Euphatris that nurtured the Mesopotamian civilization, the river Indus on whose banks the Harappa (Indus valley) civilization developed, or be it the Yellow river of the Chinese mainland that gave rise to the ancient Chinese civilization, the common thread running across the story of man and civilizations is in the form of these mighty and life giving rivers. Ancient wisdom shaped up the conduct of man in a way that achieved a delicate equilibrium with Mother Nature in general and the rivers that nurtured him in particular. Not only man respected the unassailable forces of nature, he also paid obeisance to its immense power and life giving force by being respectful and careful in his activities so as to not to harm or disturb the natural cycles.

However, with the progress of time, especially after the momentous Industrial revolution, the gap between man and nature began to increase, and in the maddening pace of development that resulted, man distanced himself from Nature, and in a sense is now cut off from the intimate relationship that was the hallmark of the story of man and his quest for development and prosperity. This sort of development came at a huge price, and increasingly in the twenty first century, man began to feel the after effects such kind of development that is far removed from sustainable model and has done harm to the delicate equilibrium that has existed between him and Nature. The phenomenon of Climate Change is a problem of epic proportions, and threatens to jolt up the human civilization from its slumber, with its devastating after effects that are being increasingly felt by man in the present times.

In the contemporary times, with the advent of the internet and the resultant information explosion, man may have achieved significant progress on the material front, however, even today, the saga of relationship between the rivers and civilization, a bond that was forged since the dawn of civilizations and nurtured ever since, continues. Major cities of the world are located on the banks of vast and majestic rivers, and India is no different. Be it the river Ganga, the life force not only in the physical terms of this ancient civilization, or the other rivers flowing through this ancient land, every major river has been revered and worshipped so as to be thankful for their nurturing and patronage to the people living on their banks. Surat, a prosperous city in the western state of Gujarat, one of the most industrialized states of India, is situated on the banks of river Tapi, and this Riversutra is the story of the river Tapi and Surat, and what follows is the description of the highs and lows in this intricate relationship that has let the river shape up the city and vice versa.

Sutra in Sanskrit language means beautiful verses or statements, and Riversutra is an attempt to link the evolution of Surat vis-à-vis the river Tapi, and how these two entities have been interacting with each other and shaping up a common destiny that is going to unfold in the times ahead, with a sense of both hope and achievement. The statements in this story may be far from beautiful, however, it is not in the structure of the words underlying this story, but the outcome and the essence that is created by them, that is of significance, and may be termed as beautiful, as it is something that has infused life and hope in the people of this fast growing metropolis.

The city of Surat in the Gujarat state receives high rainfall in the monsoons, something in excess of 1000mm annually. With the increasing pace of development in the textile hub of Surat, the demand for excess land and water has been increasing at a steady pace. Ever since the 1970s, the city has been witnessing frequent bouts of floods due to the highly erratic and unpredictable pattern of the Indian monsoon, with its unpredictability increasing with the onset of climate change at the turn of the new millennium. Due to this combination, the city managers of Surat have been increasing confronting events, especially during the time of the monsoon, when they have to open the floodgates of the Ukai dam, located outside this bustling city, and Surat had to battle with devastating floods that caused huge damage to the economic fabric and strained the infrastructure of the city. On top of it all, the cost of human life and misery that were the direct consequences of the floods left the people to grapple with something that had not been foreseen by them, and in majority of case, they were not the direct causes of the devastation that the floods brought with them.

Due to the unregulated development, changes in the river regime, siltation of the river and a host of other local factors, that combined with the global factors of warming and climate change, Surat had to face the wrath of Tapi on a more frequent basis in the form of devastating floods. The increasing siltation of the river, along with the unregulated constructions on the river bed of Tapi resulted in the reduced carrying capacity of the river, and this combined with heavy rainfall resulted in a dangerous cocktail of undesirable factors converging to flood the city with misery and devastation.

Now comes the positive part of the story, and the people of Surat, and its city managers in particular, decided to take proactive measures to prevent the river Tapi from bursting its banks and prevent the floods in wrecking havoc on the city. Surat has one of the more proactive municipal corporations in the Indian context, and has a fair level of technical, managerial and economic capacity to tackle the problems of this rapidly growing city. The Surat Municipal Corporation took a positive initiative in tackling the menace of regular floods in Tapi and for this purpose brought together a host of stakeholders at the international, national and the local levels that has helped them to create an effective mechanism for controlling the floods. These stakeholders have constituted a body named as Surat Climate Change Trust (SCCT) and this trust comprises of the state government departments, the municipal corporation departments, business representatives in the form of Southern Gujarat Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SGCCI) and academic institutes such as the Sardar Vallabhbhai National Institute of Technology, Center of Social Studies, the Gujarat State Disaster Management Authority (GSDMA) and Integrated Natural Resource Management cell of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi.

The SCCT is responsible for flood information generation, dissemination, preparedness, warning and flood management. The common interaction between these stakeholders have resulted in the formation of an effective mechanism that has learned from the bitter experiences of the past and has created an end to end warning system spanning over three Indian states, as the catchment area of river Tapi is spread out in the states of Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and Gujarat. The SCCT has established an early warning system that comprises the installation of weather systems, transfer mechanism from the catchment area to the Ukai reservoir to the Surat city, development of weather and flow prediction models and improvement and fine tuning of existing flood preparedness and action plans.

The SCCT has been successful in bringing together the various stakeholders that comprise of the people of Surat, and in particular the poor and the marginalized class that have borne the maximum brunt of the floods in the Tapi. With the aid of tools such as Geographical Information Systems (GIS) and technical expertise provided by TARU Leading Edge, city level spatial data has been created for the purpose of flood management. As a direct consequence of such positive initiatives, during the monsoon of 2013, SCCT was able to use the system created to accurately predict the flood caused by the extreme precipitation events in the middle and lower Tap basin and also envisage floods in the Khadi (tidal creek). With the aid of the spatial maps and enhanced flood preparedness and management measures, Surat was able to effectively deal with the floods of 2013, and the sad story of the earlier floods has been averted. In addition, the SCCT is busy in collecting and refining the test results and the data generated and thus fine tune the flood prediction model as well as the inundation model that have already been developed.

SCCT has been the turning point in this Riversutra, and has been successful in forging a mechanism that can deal with the after effects of the spate in the water level of the Tapi in the monsoons, and put in place highly effective flood management techniques and also evacuation plans, that has considerably reduced the human misery, mammoth economic loss and damage to the city infrastructure, the inevitable consequences of the devastating floods that have ravaged Surat on a regular basis. The initiative taken by SCCT has been a kind of healing touch to the insensitivity and greed that had distanced the people of Surat from the life giving force of the river Tapi. Tapi has once again assumed the role of a life giver to Surat instead of contributing to the damage and loss to human lives due to the floods. While this initiative is a welcome change, and in this case, has been a major turning point in the evolution of Surat as a major economic hub of the region, the more profound change will only take place when there is a positive shift in the thinking and approach of the people and the city managers of Surat, to adopt practices and measures that respect Mother Nature and live in tandem with the natural cycles, rather than distancing themselves from the life giving force of Nature. It is this change in approach that can give a positive spin to the current events worldwide that have amply demonstrated the retaliation that Nature can wreak on man when the limits of violations exceed the threshold. Earth has never stood still, change is inevitable, and nobody can stop the change. However, by adopting a model of sustainable development that not only respects the power of nature, but also harnesses its power to the benefit of man and civilization, man would be able to grow and prosper in the lap of Mother Nature and the Riversutra will continue to script sagas of higher achievements and momentous events that lie ahead of us.

Image courtesy: tripthirsty.com