Upper Pus Dam, also called Pus Dam, 25 km northwest of

Pusad Pusad, with ancient name ''Pushpawanti'' named after the Pus river, is the second largest city in the Yavatmal district of Vidarbha region in Maharashtra state of India. Over the decades, ruling politicians' failure to address people's demand ...

city, is an earthfill dam on Pus river in

Yavatmal district Yavatmal district , əʋət̪maːɭformerly known as Yeotmal, is a district of the Indian state of Maharashtra. It is located in the region of Vidarbha, in the east-central part of the state. It is Vidarbha's third-largest district by popula ...

Maharashtra Maharashtra () is a state in the western peninsular region of India occupying a substantial portion of the Deccan Plateau. It is bordered by the Arabian Sea to the west, the Indian states of Karnataka and Goa to the south, Telangana to th ...

state in

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

. There is another downstream dam 25 km southeast of Pusad city near Mahagaon, called

Lower Pus Dam Lower Pus Dam, 25 km southeast of Pusad city, is an earthfill dam on Pus river near Mahagaon in Yavatmal district of Maharashtra state of India. There is another downstream dam 25 km northwest of Pusad city called Upper Pus Dam which was buil ...

, which was built in 1983. Other nearby dams are Arunawati Dam (40 km north of Pusad) in

Digras Digras is a city and a municipal council in the Yavatmal district located in the state of Maharashtra, India. Digras is 638 km from state capital Mumbai and 221 km from winter capital Nagpur. Places of Interest Mallikarjun Temple Ghanti Ba ...

built in 1994 and Isapur Dam (30 km southwest of Pusad) built in 1982.

Water shortage Water scarcity (closely related to water stress or water crisis) is the lack of fresh water resources to meet the standard water demand. There are two types of water scarcity. One is ''physical.'' The other is ''economic water scarcity''. Physic ...

is an issue in

Vidarbha Vidarbha (Pronunciation: Help:IPA/Marathi, �id̪əɾbʱə is a geographical region in the west Indian States and union territories of India, state of Maharashtra. Forming the eastern part of the state, it comprises Amravati Division, Amrav ...

region, in June 2019 Pus dam had zero percent water of its live capacity of 91,000 million litres.levels in Maharashtra’s dams down to 6.8% of total capacity
16 June 2019. Though it rose to 20.67% by 11 August 2019 due to arrival of monsoon.With parts of Maharashtra flooded, Marathwada, Vidarbha still wait for rain
The Indian Express, 11 August 2019.

Hydrology

The Pus River flows through Pusad taluka, the

Arunavati River Arunavati river is a seasonal tributary of the Tapi river in India. It originates and flows from the Sangvi village and merges into the Tapi river near Uparpind village in Shirpur tehsil. The river flows mostly in monsoon. There are many dam ...

and

Adan River The Adan River () is a river in Washim district, Washim District, Maharashtra, India and a principal tributary of the Painganga River. Geography The source of the Adan River is in the Washim district of Maharashtra. The Arunavati River meets th ...

through

Darwha Darwha is a town and a municipal council in Yavatmal district in the state of Maharashtra, India. History Locals believe Rango Bapuji Gupte, a freedom fighter had lived incognito in the town. The town is also famous for 'Golibar Chowk', squa ...

taluka.1964, "District Census Handbook, aharashtra Osmanabad", Superintendent of Census Operations Maharashtra, Government Printing and Stationery, Maharashtra State, India.

Murray Leaf Murray John Leaf (born June 1, 1939) is an American social and cultural anthropologist. Education He was born in New York City in 1939, and grew up in Tucson, Arizona. After active duty for training in the United States Army Reserves in 1957, he a ...

explains that the Pus valley lies in a wide but isolated upland valley in the tribal area which has small towns and very few highways as most of area is covered with teak and sal forests which are illegally felled by the poachers. Pus river originates in

Ajantha, Maharashtra Ajanta or Ajantha is a village in Aurangabad district, Maharashtra, on the road between Jalgaon and Aurangabad near the Ajanta Caves. Geography It has an average elevation of . History The Ajanta Caves were discovered in 1819 by John Smit ...

, near

Washim Washim (Vatsagulma) is a city and a municipal council, Municipal Council in Washim district in the Indian state of Maharashtra. Washim is the district headquarters of Washim district. History Washim was known earlier known as Vatsagulma and ...

town. It flows through Pusad, converges with

Penganga River The Painganga River (also known as the Penganga River) is the chief river of the Buldhana district, Hingoli district, Nanded district, Yavatmal district, Chandrapur district and Washim district in the Maharashtra state in India. It flows along th ...

Penganga river
telangana360.com, accessed 6 November 2019. near Mahur in

Nanded district Nanded district (Marathi pronunciation: Help:IPA/Marathi, aːn̪d̪eɖ is a districts of Maharashtra, district of Maharashtra state in central India. The city of Nanded is the district headquarters. History Nanded is mentioned in historica ...

of Maharashtra, Penganga River in turn flows into

Wardha River The Wardha River, also known as the Varada River, is a major river in Vidarbha, Maharashtra, which originates in the Satpura Range and flows into the Wain ganga river to form the Pranhita river which finally joins the Godavari river. Origin ...

, which in turn flows into

Pranhita River The Pranahita River is the largest tributary of Godavari River covering about 34% of its drainage basin conveying the combined waters of the Penganga River, the Wardha River, and the Wainganga River. By virtue of its extensive network of trib ...

, and Pranhita in turn flows in to

Godavari River The Godavari (, Help:IPA/Sanskrit, �od̪aːʋəɾiː is India's second longest river after the Ganges River, Ganga River and drains the third largest Drainage basin, basin in India, covering about 10% of India's total geographical area. It ...

which finally end in the

Bay of Bengal The Bay of Bengal is the northeastern part of the Indian Ocean. Geographically it is positioned between the Indian subcontinent and the Mainland Southeast Asia, Indochinese peninsula, located below the Bengal region. Many South Asian and Southe ...

just east of

Rajahmundry Rajahmundry ( ), officially Rajamahendravaram, is a city in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh and district headquarters of East Godavari district. It is the fifth most populated city in the state. During British rule, the district of Rajahmu ...

in the state of

Andhra Pradesh Andhra Pradesh (ISO 15919, ISO: , , AP) is a States and union territories of India, state on the East Coast of India, east coast of southern India. It is the List of states and union territories of India by area, seventh-largest state and th ...

. All these rivers drain the

Deccan Plateau The Deccan is a plateau extending over an area of and occupies the majority of the Indian peninsula. It stretches from the Satpura Range, Satpura and Vindhya Ranges in the north to the northern fringes of Tamil Nadu in the south. It is bound ...

in the south-easterly and easterly directions along the general slope of the plateau.Saravanam Karthikeyan and Anand Kumar, 1993, Flora of Yavatmal District, Maharashtra, Page viii.

Amravati Division Amravati Division, also known as Varhad, is an Indian one of the six administrative divisions of Maharashtra state in India. Amravati and Nagpur Division, Nagpur divisions constitute the ancient Vidarbha region. Amravati Division is bound by Mad ...

of Vidharba has 446 dams. Among those the command area of medium size Pus River irrigation system has 25265 ha. of which 13680 ha is cultivatable and further 8215 ha is irrigable, and the project is designed with 114% "irrigation density" which is the ratio of total irrigated area to total irrigable area.

, 1998
Pragmatism and Development: The Prospect for Pluralist Transformation in The Third World
Bergin and Garvey, Page 60-. For the irrigation, "Pus river" has Upper Pus Dam 18 km northwest of Pusad town built in 1971, and

near Mahagaon 40 km east of Pusad built in 1983. Main crops are

millet Millets () are a highly varied group of small-seeded grasses, widely grown around the world as cereal crops or grains for fodder and human food. Most millets belong to the tribe Paniceae. Millets are important crops in the Semi-arid climate, ...

wheat Wheat is a group of wild and crop domestication, domesticated Poaceae, grasses of the genus ''Triticum'' (). They are Agriculture, cultivated for their cereal grains, which are staple foods around the world. Well-known Taxonomy of wheat, whe ...

, tur,

cotton Cotton (), first recorded in ancient India, is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective case, around the seeds of the cotton plants of the genus '' Gossypium'' in the mallow family Malvaceae. The fiber is almost pure ...

, groundnut,

sunflower The common sunflower (''Helianthus annuus'') is a species of large annual forb of the daisy family Asteraceae. The common sunflower is harvested for its edible oily seeds, which are often eaten as a snack food. They are also used in the pr ...

, etc. In the hilly parts of Pusad taluka the

soil type A soil type is a taxonomic unit in soil science. All soils that share a certain set of well-defined properties form a distinctive soil type. Soil type is a technical term of soil classification, the science that deals with the systematic categ ...

is coarse gravelly or loose friable texture, of black colour. In terms of

fish farming Fish farming or pisciculture involves commercial breeding of fish, most often for food, in fish tanks or artificial enclosures such as fish ponds. It is a particular type of aquaculture, which is the controlled cultivation and harvesting of ...

, the minor

carp The term carp (: carp) is a generic common name for numerous species of freshwater fish from the family (biology), family Cyprinidae, a very large clade of ray-finned fish mostly native to Eurasia. While carp are prized game fish, quarries and a ...

fishes constitute 75 to 95% of the total catch in the Pus River reservoirs.V. V. Sugunan, 1995, "Reservoir Fisheries of India", Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Page 211.

Dam details

Specifications

The height of the dam above its lowest foundation is while the length is . The volume content is and gross storage capacity is .

Purpose

* Irrigation

References

{{reflist Dams in Yavatmal district Dams completed in 1971 1971 establishments in Maharashtra

Hydrology

Dam details

Specifications

Purpose

See also

References