44
India has 12 river basins with drainage area exceeding 20000 sq.km. These
are:
1.
Indus
7.
Pennar
2.
Ganga-Brahmaputra-Meghna
8.
Cauveri
3.
Brahmani-Baitarani
9.
Tapi
4.
Mahanadi
10.
Narmada
5.
Godavari
11.
Mahi
6.
Krishna
12.
Sabarmati
Subarnarekha basin having a drainage area of 19296 sq km is also an
important river basin. The remaining river basins can be conveniently clubbed
together into seven river system clusters for purpose of planning and
management. Therefore in all, India comprises of basic twenty river basin units
from the point of water resource management.
It is observed fromTable 4.1 that average annual run off per capita in Brahmaputra
basin is highest at 21000 m3 and very low in west flowing rivers of Kutch and
Saurashtra, being only 165 m
3
. East flowing rivers between Pennar and
Kanyakumari is also very low 487 m3 only. The figures are based on 1986
census and the current figures will be even lower.
