Bhopal: Public Health Engineering Dept Drafts Bill To Curb Borewell-Related Accidents, To Be Tabled In Assembly

Bhopal (Madhya Pradesh): To prevent incidents related to open borewell, which sometimes claims the lives of children, the Public Health Engineering (PHE) department is going to come up with a Bill.

The Bill will be tabled in the upcoming Assembly session, which will become an Act after approval. The state may become the first in the country to have such an Act.

A senior PHE department officer said the chief secretary felt that there is the need to have a stringent law, which shall act as a deterrent.

"We have prepared a draft bill, in which effort has been made that if a borewell is left open in case of unsuccessful or is abandoned then it would be the responsibility of either land owner or the borewell digging machine owner to close it. The discussion is underway on whom the responsibility shall be fixed," he said.

He added that if the land owner fails to close the borewell then the government officers will step in and in such case, strict action will be taken. The draft bill is vouching for penalty and big punishment against the erring persons.

The secretary, PHE department, P Narhari, said, "The Bill will have penalty as well as punishment provisions."

Another officer, who played an important role in drafting the bill, said the bill has been sent to the law department to get a nod.

The bill has certain provisions. For instance, the borewell machine owner has to upload the photo of the borewell on the Parakh app so that the department can have data. It would be mandatory to construct a PVC cover block around the borewell in case it is unsuccessful. As of now, casing is taken out from the unsuccessful borewell and is covered temporarily and it becomes a peril for children.