ari Doab
Canal.~--The Lower Chenab Canal takes the whole available supply of the
Chenab river. But it does not command a large area in the Rechna Doab
lying in the west of Gujranwala, in which rain cultivation is very risky
and well cultivation is costly. No help can be got from the Ravi, as the
Upper Bari Doab Canal exhausts its supply. Desirable as the extension of
irrigation in the areas mentioned above is, the problem of supplying it
might well have seemed insuperable. The bold scheme known as the Triple
Project which embraces the construction of the Upper Jhelam, Upper
Chenab, and Lower Bari Doab Canals, is based on the belief that the
Jhelam river has even in the cold weather water to spare after feeding
the Lower Jhelam Canal. The true _raison d'etre_ of the Upper Jhelam
Canal, whose head-works are at Mangla in Kashmir a little north of the
Gujrat district, is to throw a large volume of water into the Chenab at
Khanki, where the Lower Chenab Canal takes off, and so set free an equal
supply to be taken out of the Chenab higher up at Merala in Sialkot,
where are the head-works of the Upper Chenab Canal. But the Upper Jhelam
Canal will also water annually some 345,000 acres in Gujrat and Shahpur.
The Upper Chenab Canal will irrigate 648,000 acres mostly in Gujranwala,
and will be carried across the Ravi by an aqueduct at Balloke in the
south of Lahore. Henceforth the canal is known as the Lower Bari Doab,
which will water 882,000 acres, mostly owned by the State, in the
Montgomery and Multan districts. On the other two canals the area of
Government land is not large. The Triple Project is approaching
completion, and irrigation from the Upper Chenab Canal has begun. The
engineering difficulties have been great, and the forecast does not
promise such large gains as even the Lower Jhelam Canal. But a return of
7-1/2 p.c. is expected.

~Monsoon or Inundation Canals.~--The numerous monsoon or inundation
canals, which take off from the Indus, Jhelam, Chenab, Ravi, and Sutlej,
though individually petty works, perform an important office in the
thirsty south-western districts. By their aid a _kharif_ crop can be
raised without working the wells in the hot weather, and with luck the
fallow can be well soaked in autumn, and put under wheat and other
spring crops. For the maturing of these crops a prudent cultivator
should not trust to the scanty cold weather rainfall, but should
irrigate them from a well. The Sidhnai has a we