The Grand Anicut, Trichy, Tamil Nadu India

The Grand Anicut, also known as the Kallanai, is an ancient dam built on the Kaveri River in the state of Tamil Nadu in southern India. This dam is one of the oldest dams in the world and was built roughly 2000 years back. Grand Anicut is about 24 kilometers from main Tiruchirapalli town, and opens up wonderful views of the Cauvery River and the serene patch of greenery beyond it. It was built by the Chola king Karikalan around the 1st Century AD and is considered one of the oldest water-diversion or water-regulator structures in the world, which is still in use.

Locally called Kallanai, the Grand Anicut dam was built on the Cauvery River in the 2nd century by Chola king, Karikalan. This massive structure was later reinforced by the British. Grand Anicut is believed to be one of the oldest water-diversion structures in the world that continues to be functional. Slicing through the Erode and Salem districts, the Cauvery River proceeds to join the Bhavani River in the town of Bhavani, home to the Sangameswarar temple. It is an important pilgrimage site at the confluence of two rivers. At Trichy, the Cauvery River gushes past the historic Rock and cuts a tributary at the Srirangam island.

Made of unhewn stones, the Kallanai dam is 1080-foot long (329 meters) and 60-foot wide (20 meters) across the main stream of the Cauvery. Originally, the structure was built to divert the river water through canals across the fertile delta region for irrigation. Despite technological innovations, the dam is regarded as an engineering marvel that has inspired many including one Sir Arthur Cotton who built a dam in the 19th century straddling the Kollidam, a major tributary of the Cauvery River. The purpose of the dam was to divert the waters of the Kaveri across the fertile Delta region for irrigation via canals. So well built was the Anicut that Arthur Cotton, arguably the most famous civil engineer in the history of the British raj, admitted that he used its design for 19th century irrigation works on the same river system. Cotton’s improvement to the dam makes the Grand Anicut the oldest functioning irrigation works in the world.