Secretary Ministry of Water and Power Mohammad Younus Dagha presented the dam's financial proposal to the prime minister.The dam will be constructed in Gilgit-Baltistan's Diamer district.
Sharif instructed Dagha and the secretary of planning and finance to expedite the completion of the financial process and begin the physical process before the end of next year, Radio Pakistan reported.
The financial plan, made on a self-reliance basis, proposes that construction of the dam will receive a portion of the required funding from allocations made by the Public Sector Development Programme and from resources generated by Water and Power Development Authority (Wapda).
The construction of Diamer-Bhasha Dam has been considerably delayed. It was approved for construction by Council of Common Interests in the year 2009.
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The Diamer Basha Dam will provide 8.1 Million Acre-Feet (MAF) of gross storage of which 6.4 MAF will be the live storage and a capacity to produce 4500 MWs of cheap and clean energy.
The storage capacity in the existing dams in Pakistan is fast depleting due to silting and the country is losing on its agricultural production after every few years due to dry season and needs to be overcome by constructing more storages.
It was originally scheduled for completion in 2016, and then 2019, when a decision about its construction was taken by the military government of Gen Pervez Musharraf, but work on the project did not progress at all during his rule.
On October, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) had refused to commit funds for USD 14 billion dam project, two years after the World Bank declined to fund the project following Islamabad's refusal to seek an No Objection Certificate from India.