The Central Government has shown green signal to fulfil a long-standing demand for a Rushikulya-Mahanadi river linking project. If executed, millions of farmers of the State will be benefited by the project while it would also remove drinking water scarcity of Ganjam, Khordha and Nayagarah districts.
According to information, on the direction of the Central Government, a team of experts of the National Water Resources Commission (NWRC) will visit Odisha on April 6 to take stock of the situation and study the technical feasibility of the proposed river linking project.
Notably, senior BJP leader Rama Chandra Panda had met Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Parliament House in New Delhi on March 19 last and submitted a memorandum urging him for execution of the Rushikulya-Mahanadi linking project. The Prime Minister had assured Panda to take necessary measures for execution of the project soon.
As per information, the team of experts of NWRC (National Water Resources Commission), headed by NWRC Chairperson, after discussing the issue with the Central Government will first visit the Rushikulya site at Barmul Point of Nayagarah district and thereafter, will proceed to visit the other strategic river points of Ganjam, Nayagarah, Khordha and will analyse the technical feasibility at length, sources said. The team will notably visit the strategic Rushikulya point at Kabisuryanagar in Ganjam district where the proposed 225-km-long canal would flow from the Mahanadi’s Barmul point and meet at Kabisuryanagar via Ganjam, Nayagarah and Khordha districts. The high-powered expert team of the NWRC is likely to discuss on the implementation of the proposed mega project with top officials of different departments of the State Government.
It may be recalled that Panda was the first to conceive the idea of river linking in the State and had submitted a memorandum to former Prime Minister AB Vajpayee. Though there has been a consistent demand from south Odisha since 1986 to protect river Rushikulya from drying up, it was unheeded by the successive Central Governments. Panda, who led the historic protest rally of farmers, citizens, and women covering 300 km known as Jala Yatra from Kasinagar to the Raj Bhavan in Bhubaneswar in 2010, had also submitted a memorandum to the Governor on the issue.