The Bihar Government was left red faced and had to scurry for cover when a Rs 389.31 crore Ganga pump canal scheme came to an abrupt halt as a wall of the canal caved in at Bateshwar Sthan in Kahalgaon in Bhagalpur district. The scheme for which people waited for forty years was to be inaugurated by Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Wednesday. The disaster occurred on Tuesday evening when on trial basis five out of 14 motors were started but then wall could not bear the force of Ganga water and collapsed.
The CM cancelled his programme hurriedly as senior officials of the Water Resources Department (WRD) rushed to the spot which had already been spruced up for the inauguration.
As a result of the collapse of canal wall, water gushed in inundating the residential areas, market and township of Thermal Power Station. The heavy current of the water also damaged road connectivity. This project was supposed to irrigate 22,816 hectares of land in Bihar’s Bhagalpur and 4,887 hectares in Jharkhand’s Godda. It is a joint project of the two States.
Making fun of the quality of construction, RJD supremo lalu Prasad said action should be taken against the WRD Minister Rajiv Ranjan Singh lalan, but added that Nitish has no guts to take action against him. “When embankments were breached during floods lalan said it happened because of rats. Will he say that the canal wall collapsed because crocodile hit it with its snoutIJ” he said sarcastically. Former Deputy CM Tejashwi Prasad Yadav smell corruption in the project and said, “The project became a victim of Nitish Kumar’s corruption. Nitish should tell if this project was eaten away by the rats.”
lalan Singh said the wall has collapsed but it has not affected or caused damage to the new construction. WRD Superintending Engineer Gyan Prakash said that the wall would be raised again within a week and after that fresh date for inauguration would be announced.
The project was approved way back in 1977 by the Planning commission at an estimated cost of Rs 13.88 crore. However, the first administrative approval was cleared in 2008 involving a cost of Rs 380.31 crore.