Annals of Arid Zone - 21 (1), 49-54, 1982

Proposed settlement types in Rajasthan CanalCommand Area

B. D. BHATTACHARJEE*

Town Planning Department, West Circle, Bikaner

INTRODUCTION

The Rajasthan desert is potentiallyfertile and the vast tracts of this desertland which have rich agricultural soilsare lying barren and waste only due toscarcity of "WATER". The RajasthanCanal proposes to bring "water", thebasic need of the area, thereby convert-ing more of its area into good cultivatedland. Other direct and indirect benefitsthat will accrue to the area are end offrequent famines, employment to many,crop production, drinking water avail-ability, control of the desert, etc.

The Rajasthan Canal Project, envi-sages to irrigate about 20 lakh hectaresof desert land along the internationalborder of the State of Rajasthan. Besidesconverting the hitherto waste land into acountry's greenery and wiping out its per-petual drought conditions, the projectpromises to settle about 20 to 25 lakhpeople giving employment to about 5lakh families. The canal net work hasalready reached its half way and morethan 400,000 hectares of cultivated landhave already been permanently allottedto cultivators and about 80,000 familieshave been settled by now.

PROPOSED NEW SETTLEMENTS

Apart from the general Area Develop-ment, programme having been under-taken by the Government, efforts areafoot to settle the new incoming popula-tion in a planned manner. This incom-ing population is planned to besettled in about 1200 new village settle-ments, 160 amenity villages and 28market towns. A planned distribution ofthe incoming population in various hier-archies of settlements has been felt tobe very necessary for proper growth anddevelopment of the agricultural and theresulting socio-economic and industrialactivities of the area.

The population is being planned to besettled in a 3 tier system of human set-tlements; at the lower level being thebasic villages at the middle amenity vil-lages (agro service centres) and at thetop being the market towns. Physicallocations at site of 400 such new ruraland 14 urban settlements have alreadybeen finalised. Distribution of these set-tlements in the area has been done insuch a way that maximum economy isachieved in laying the infra structuralfacilities and optimum utilisation could

• Present address : Senior Research Officer (planning), Town and Regional planningDepartment, Govt. of Rajasthan, Jaipur.

50 : B. D. BHATTACHARJEE

be made of physical distribution of socio-economic facilitiies. The criteria on whichthe location, size and other character-istics of these new rural and urban set-tlements have been decided are as givenbelow:

(I) Basic village settlements

This is the smallest unit of humansettlement. Persons who would settlehere would be farmers who shall havefarm land around the villages. While,therefore, .deciding the size and locationof a village the primary factor kept inmind i that the farmer's land is not faraway from his village so that he has tocover only the minimum possible dist-ance to reach his farm. The radius worksout to 21/2 kms covering an area ofapprox. 1600 hectares. On this basisthere will be ·a total of about 1200 basicvi lages in the eanal irrigated belt. Eachsuch village shall have a population ofabout 200 families (175 families agri-cultual and the rest non-agricultural).This has been calculated on the basisof 6.25 h~ctare holding that each familyis being provided with in the villages.Facilities to 1!>eprovided in the villagesare a prima.r.y school, drinking waterwelL Ayurv.edic Dispensary, a fewshop,s, a sma liUral godown, a smallworkshop, a village nursery, village in-4ustries. electricity etc.

(2) Amenity village (Agro-service cel1-trps)

These shall be the vital organs of therural community. There are so manyneeds and services required by rural po-

pulation that can not be made availablein each and every basic village. Theseshall have an influence radius of 6.50 to8 km, covering an area of approximate-ly 10,500 hectares and serve its own andsix basic village population. Its own po-pulation is proposed to be around 3,000to 4,000 persons but it shall serve theneeds of about 10,000 persons. Facilitiesto be provided here are Upper PrimarySchool, allopathic dispensary (6 beds),Post office, storage godowns, tractor and.transport facilities, veterinary dispensary,Cooperative bank, work-shops, fi~teredwater supply, electricity etc. As the nameitself indicates, these shall primarily actas servicing centres to the rural popula-tion.

(3) Market towns

Next in the hierarchy comes markettowns. The Rajasthan Canal Area shallhave 28 market towns varying from10,000 to 50,000 persons. Out of these7 will be 'A' class, 17 'B' class and 4 'C'class market towns. Following are thecriteria adopted for fixing locations ofthese 28 market towns:-

(a) Rajasthan Canal Project areashall have a net command area ofapprox. 1.125 million hectares. Averagecrop production at the optimum intensityof irrigation has been estimated at 20 to25 quintals per hectare. After local con-sumption. there would be a net surplusof about 15 quintals of crop per hectarewhich will find its way to markets forsale. Tn a 'B' class market yard th~rewould be an approx. arrival of 50,000tonnes of crop annually. Thus, for anapproximate command area of 40,000hectares there would be one market town.

SETTLEMENT TYPES IN RAJASTHAN CANAL AREA : 51

(b) From the distance point of viewa market town should not be farther thanabout 15 to 20 km from its farthestvillage. Each agro service centre is toserve 6 to 7 basic villages and eachmarket town is to serve 6 to 7 agroservice centres and about 40 to 45 basicvillages. All these villages and agro ser-vice centres shall fall within a radius ofabout 15 to 20 km from the markettown. Two market towns will be about30 to 35 km apart.

(c) As soon as the area is settledthere will be need for community faci-lities of various orders. To meet theserequirements community facilities likeschools, hospitals etc. are to be pro-vided in an hierarchial order in thesettlements. The market towns shall meetthe higher order requirements of commu-nity facilities. These have thus to beproperly and equitably distributed in thecanal area so that the residents have notto cover a longer distance to avail ofthese facilities.

(d) While locating the market townstheir physical location with respect toexisting conditions on ground have alsoto be taken into account. The configura-tion of the canal belt being such that itruns in a "Corridor" like form along theinternational border, the market townshave been located along the central axisof this "Corridor" so that they are equi-distant from the western and easternflanks of the hinterland. Also. as far aspossible, these have been located at thealready existing village centres or townsso that some nucleus is available for thegrowth of the new town.

(e) Some of the market towns select-ed fall outside the canal command area.These are already well established townsand are at the periphery of the canal

command area. These have well estab-lished markets and have trading, indus-trial and other facilities. The surplusproduct of the command area shall findtheir way in large quantities to thesetowns. These towns have many otherfacilities also which will be made use ofby the command area population. Thegrowth of these towns will be greatlyaffected by the canal project. Some ofthese towns are Hanumangarh In., Hanu-mangarh Town, Pilibanga, Raisinghna-gar, Suratgarh, Bikaner, Phalodi andJaisalmer.

(f) The market towns have been lo-cated keeping in view the proposedoverall transportation net work of theso called 'canal region'. Most of themarket towns shall find their locationson through roads of arterial or sub-arte-rial category. This will help in the move·ment of goods both inwardly and out-wardly and help in faster developmentof the area in general and the markettowns in particular. Most of the townsshall also have rail links.

(g) The project area's proximity toPakistan border has also been taken intoaccount. The bigger towns where privateand Govt. investments will be heavier tosectors like industries, commerce etc.have been located farther away from theinternational border.

Development of a market town de-pends to a considerable extent as to howconveniently it is linked by roads withits hinterland villages. The vilIages andagroservice centres around a markettown of Rajasthan Canal area are beingprovided with easy accesses to marketsso that minimum time is taken by thefarmer to take his crop to these markets.One of the reasons for poor developmentof the neighbouring Bhakra and Gang

52 B. D. BHATTACHARJEE

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Canal market towns is that they have un-developed transportation network withintheir respective hinterlands. This causedcropping up of unauthorised markets atold village centres at short intervalswhich, naturally, came in the way of de-velopment of market towns. Due care,has, there, been taken that no such in-termediate centres develop into a markettown in Rajasthan Canal area by givingconvenient links between market townstind village settlements.

The community structure and facilitiesetc. planned to be provided in village

settlements, agro service centres andmarket towns of various classes are givenin Table 1.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Grateful thanks are due to Shri H. S.Mathur, Senior Town Planner, WestZone, Rajasthan and to Shri Amal KumarSen, Scientist 2 (Cartography), CentralArid Zone Research Institute Jodhpur,for their help in writing up this paper:.