Marala Headworks is a headworks situated on the River Chenab near the city of Sialkot in Punjab province of the Pakistan.
Headworks is a civil engineering term for any structure at the head or diversion point of a waterway.
It is smaller than a barrage and is used to divert water from a river into a canal or from a large canal into a smaller canal.
Historically the phrase "headworks" derives from the traditional approach of diverting water at the start of an irrigation network and the location of these processes at the "head of the works”.
Chenab is a 1,086 kilometres (675 mi) long river which originates from Chandra Taal in the Lahul & Spiti District of Himachal Pradesh in India where it is known as Chandrabhaga.
After the two tributaries Chandra and Bhaga join at Tandi in Lahul & Spiti district and acquires the name Chenab when it enters Jammu and Kashmir near Kishtwar in India.
After cutting across the Pir Panjal Range, it enters the Sialkot District in the Pakistan.
Here the Marala Barrage was built across the river in 1968 with a maximum discharge of 1.1 million ft³/s (31,000 m³/s).
Two major water channels originate at the Marala headworks—the Marala ravi link canal and the Upper Chenab Canal. Proposals are under consideration to build Mangla Marala Link Canal to overcome any shortage of water in future.
Marala Headworks is also a picnic spot, a wildlife sanctuary and an unprotected wetland.