Chief Engineer of lower Indra Irrigation Project (lIIP) located in Nuapada district at a review meeting held at Khariar on Wednesday said, “We have not yet provided irrigation to farmers from the lower Indra project. Water has been released in the main canals only on a trial basis to test the flow. However, we hope to complete the project work before the end of 2016.”
BJP legislature Party leader Basant Panda, MlA of Nuapada, was reviewing the progress of the work and rehabilitation process of the lIIP.
A lot of irregularities in the progress of rehabilitation activities came to the fore during the discussion. All the officials of land acquisition section, canal divisions and dam division along with representatives of displaced persons were present, but none of them could provide proper information on the progress of rehabilitation and resettlement-related activities. The project personnel could not even provide detailed information on the area acquired for the project.
The project authorities initially informed that 3,855 families have been evacuated from the project area. But when they gave a list of cluster villages and the number of DPs settled in those clusters, the evacuated number reduced to 1,919. The representatives of DPs said that rest of the families are still at their old villages waiting for their claims of rehabilitation and resettlement.
Similarly, there was confusion over the exact number of landless DPs. The Water Resource Department Secretary had directed the project authorities in 2013 that families which have been living in the project area for a long time and are being surveyed under 9B of the Rehabilitation & Resettlement Policy (R&R) should be provided assistance. But the officials revealed that the project has not yet conducted a survey to identify the landless DP to include them under R&R as directed by the department.
Members of the lower Indra Bisthapit Sahayata Samiti (lIBSS) claimed that there are 316 landless DPs who have been surveyed under 9B but have not been provided any assistance.
The representatives of DPs also raised the issue of new clusters, where the DPs have settled, but the project is not recognising those as cluster villages. “There are more than 40 such clusters which have been deprived of infrastructure development works as they are not recognised by the project,” they said. The affected persons of the lIPP were on strike for 105 long days in 2012 with a 33-point charter of demands. All the construction works had been stopped during that period. The Water Resource Department had sent its Joint Secretary-level officials to discuss with the DPs to end the impasse.
The officials had agreed to fulfil many of the demands like identification landless DPs, allotment of identity cards to DPs, restoration of PDS and benefits under social security schemes, electrification in cluster villages, etc. A dateline had also been fixed for fulfilment of the demands. “But, in spite of lapse of more than two years, the demands have not been fulfilled,” lamented the DPs.
The Chief Engineer assured that activities like identification and inclusion of landless DPs and allotment of identity cards would be completed before December 31. He also assured that the demand of inclusion of new clusters under infrastructure development would be taken care of.
Besides Panda, the meeting was also attended by BJP leaders Sanjay Tiwari, Jadumani Panigrahi and DPs’ representatives Nityanand Pradhan and Alekha Majhi.