Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, May 18: Former Minister and senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader, Choudhary Sukhnandan Kumar today appealed to the officers of the Irrigation Department to get the canals in Bishnah area cleaned at an earliest so that the agriculture sector does not get affected anymore due to the water shortage.
During his visit to the villages in Bishnah area along with the local Sarpanchs and Panchs today, the senior BJP leader Sukhnandan Kumar conducted extensive tour of each village in this belt and interacted with the farmers.
While apprising the former Minister, the local farmers of Bishnah belt complained that they were not even receiving 20 per cent of water promised by the Government from time to time.
“If the Government will release water into the canals without adequate cleaning or repair due to which water has spilled over in many places, causing damage to crops, informed the locals to Sukhnandan Kumar”.
And, the Government also doesn’t compensate farmers for the damage. On top of it, across the border area, many drains and tributaries have dried up as for the several years, there has been no water in them, the locals alleged.
Appealing to the J&K UT Government, Sukhnandan Kumar said the farmers in the villages depend on canals and water pumps to irrigate their fields but since the last few years the water flow to the canals has stopped. Instead of water, canals/waterways are filled with filth, weed, wild grass and plastic water bottles covering its entire stretch till the end of the villages in Bishnah area.
“At many places the canals have dried up because the Irrigation and Flood Control Department has not properly de-silted the canals. This apathetic attitude of Irrigation Department as well as the local administration is the reason behind the sufferings of the villagers, ” Sukhnandan said, asking the concerned Executive Engineer of Bishnah belt and Chief Engineer to get the work executed in shortest possible time. “We will again visit this area and all the canals in this area must be cleaned and repaired,” Sukhnandan warned the concerned officers.
Those who accompanied the former Minister include BDC Chairman, Surjeet Kumar, Jatinder Singh, Surjeet Singh Kamal Singh, Anil Sharma, Pritam Singh, Joginder Singh, Vijay Saini and Kailash Chander all sarpanchs Rohni Sharma, Naib Sarpanch Surjit Singh, Sushil Kumar, Padam Singh, Mohinder Singh, Baghwan Dass, Janak Raj, Kuldeep Raj, ex sarpanchs and others.
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