Kopili River is an interstate river in

Northeast India , native_name_lang = mni , settlement_type = , image_skyline = , image_alt = , image_caption = , motto = , image_map = Northeast india.png , ...

that flows through the states of

Meghalaya Meghalaya (, or , meaning "abode of clouds"; from Sanskrit , "cloud" + , "abode") is a state in northeastern India. Meghalaya was formed on 21 January 1972 by carving out two districts from the state of Assam: (a) the United Khasi Hills and J ...

and

Assam Assam (; ) is a state in northeastern India, south of the eastern Himalayas along the Brahmaputra and Barak River valleys. Assam covers an area of . The state is bordered by Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh to the north; Nagaland and Manipur ...

and is the largest south bank tributary of the

Brahmaputra The Brahmaputra is a trans-boundary river which flows through Tibet, northeast India, and Bangladesh. It is also known as the Yarlung Tsangpo in Tibetan, the Siang/Dihang River in Arunachali, Luit in Assamese, and Jamuna River in Bangla. I ...

in Assam.

Course

The Kopili originates in the Meghalaya plateau and flows through Central Assam and the hill districts of Assam before its confluence with the Brahmaputra. In Assam it drains the districts of

Karbi Anglong Karbi may refer to: Places * Karbi, Armenia * Karbi Anglong Plateau, an extension of the Indian Plate in Assam, India * Karbi Anglong district, a district of Assam, north-eastern India Other uses * Karbi people, an ethnic group of North-eas ...

Dima Hasao Dima Hasao district (), earlier called North Cachar Hills district, is an administrative district in the state of Assam, India. As of 2011, it is the least populous district of Assam. Dima Hasao district is one of the two autonomous hill distr ...

, Kamrup and

Nagaon Nagaon (previously Nowgong; Assamese নগাঁও), is a town and a municipal board in Nagaon district in the Indian state of Assam. It is situated east of Guwahati. History This division was organised on the both banks of Kalang river ...

. The river flows for a total length of and has a

catchment area In human geography, a catchment area is the area from which a location, such as a city, service or institution, attracts a population that uses its services and economic opportunities. Catchment areas may be defined based on from where people are ...

of . It is noted for several spectacular waterfalls along its course which has several deep gorges and rapids in the of its flow before

debouch In hydrology, a debouch (or debouche) is a place where runoff from a small, confined space discharges into a larger, broader body of water. The word is derived from the French verb ''déboucher'' (), which means "to unblock, to clear". The term ...

ing into the plains at Nagaon district.

Waterworks

Completed in 1975, the Kopili Flow Irrigation Scheme in

Kamrup district Kamrup Rural district, or simply Kamrup district (Pron: ˈkæmˌrəp or ˈkæmˌru:p), is an administrative district in the state of Assam in India formed by dividing the old Kamrup district into two in the year 2003; other being Kamrup Metro ...

irrigates of land across 14 revenue villages and facilitates paddy cultivation. The Kopili Hydro Electric Project, located across the districts of

in Assam and

Jaintia Hills The Khasi and Jaintia Hills are a mountainous region that was mainly part of Assam and Meghalaya. This area is now part of the present Indian constitutive state of Meghalaya (formerly part of Assam), which includes the present districts of Eas ...

in Meghalaya and run by the North Eastern Electric Power Corporation, consists of the Khandong and Umrongso dams and their reservoirs and three power houses that have a total installed capacity of 275 MW.

Environmental issues

The Kopili has as many as 54 species of fish in it. Unscientific

opencast coal mining Coal mining is the process of extracting coal from the ground. Coal is valued for its energy content and since the 1880s has been widely used to generate electricity. Steel and cement industries use coal as a fuel for extraction of iron from ...

in the Kopili's upper reaches in Meghalaya has led to acidification of the river which has in turn left part of the river's course

biologically dead Dead zones are hypoxic (low-oxygen) areas in the world's oceans and large lakes. Hypoxia occurs when dissolved oxygen (DO) concentration falls to or below 2 mg of O2/liter. When a body of water experiences hypoxic conditions, aquatic flora and ...

, making the water unfit for human consumption and has led to frequent outages at the Kopili Hydro Electric Project's power stations. The 275 MW Kopili Dam Power House of NEEPCO (North Eastern Electric Power Corporation Limited) in Assam suffered major disaster on 7 Oct 2019. The penstock pipe that takes water from the Umrangso dam to the hydropower house burst during early hours in Assam’s Dima Hasao district, and massive quantity of water erupted, a lot of it entered the power house, where four employees of NEEPCO were feared to have been trapped/ washed away.

References

{{Authority control Rivers of Meghalaya Rivers of Assam Tributaries of the Brahmaputra River Karbi Anglong district Rivers of India