Manawar (Madhya Pradesh): In a bid to increase harvest and to make agriculture a profitable business, both central and the state governments spent a huge sum on infrastructure and canal construction in Nimar region.
This includes 150-kilometre long canal construction spending Rs 500 crores under Phase 4 of Omkareshwar Project and service road for transportation of agriculture harvest. The canal is supposed to start by 2016, but farmers in the region are still waiting to get benefit from the canal.
Added to this, the continuous movement of heavy trucks of private company Ultratech Cement factory near Manawar on the service road is posing threat to both service road which is meant for farmers as well as canal.
Villagers here claimed that the service road near the canal is meant only for the maintenance of the canal and for the movement of farmers and the administration prohibited the movement of the heavy vehicle above eight tons on the road. A notice board has also been put up in this regard, but neither company nor drivers bother to follow this.
According to the guideline of the Narmada Valley Development Authority (NVDA), there is a provision for the movement of vehicles below 8 ton capacity on this service road, but vehicles which are much heavier than the prescribed weight are plying on this road and it not only damaging the road but posing threat to canal wall as well.
Villagers accusing local administration of ignoring the issue claimed that administrative officials ignored their plight for their interest.
Villagers added that the cement company is working on the construction of the road at a very fast pace, whereas before the construction of the road, the company needs to ensure that all the joints of the canal and pipes are sealed with concrete. Then, a strong wall should be made and only after following this rule, the road construction work should be done. However, all this was not done and the company constructing the road at full pace, villager added.
Meanwhile, Mukesh Bhadoria, a representative of Narmada Bachao Andolan leader Megha Patkar accusing executive engineer, Manavar SDM and Dhar district collector of gross negligence said that administration should pay attention as many heavy vehicles more than the capacity are plying on the road ignoring notice board installed by the administration.
The farmers were supposed to get the benefit of the canal, but they did not get it as heavy vehicles plying on the road are continuously damaging the road as well as posing threat to the canal and the pipeline as well.
Bhadoria asked why the officials are not taking action even after the entire operation is going on against the norms.
When contacted Omkareshwar Project Phase No 4 executive engineer RP Uike admitted that the service road near the canal is meant for farmers and the heavy vehicles passing through it are wrong and the private company UltraTech Cement Factory which got permission for the construction of the road has been received from our department Narmada Valley Development Authority (NVDA) Bhopal.
Although before the construction, the joint of all the canal pipes between four-kilometre stretch has to be cemented and a wall has to be built around the canals and only after that the road construction work will start, Uike said.
Earlier, some farmers from Manawar assembly constituency took the courtís shelter and district collector Pankaj Jain took cognizance of the matter after getting information.
