The Opposition parties and farmers’ unions have condemned the Haryana Government for denotifying the Dadupur Nalvi canal project.
Almost after a year of taking a decision to de-notify the Dadupur Nalvi canal project, Haryana Government has issued the gazette notification in this regard.
Condemning the denotification of the canal project, senior Congress leader and communications in-charge of Indian National Congress, Randeep Singh Surjewala described the State Government's move as the 'grave injustice and deception with farmers' of the northern Haryana.
Surjewala said that this wrong decision of Haryana Government has dealt multiple blows to the farmers.
“On one side, the farmers have not been paid the compensation for their land as per the Court decision, and at the same time, the farmers would have to pay back the received compensation along with the interest for ‘Tughlaqi Farmaan’,” the Congress leader said.
Surjewala, an MlA from Kaithal said that there is wide spread resentment among the farmers against this wrong decision of the Government, and the BJP would have to pay a heavy price for this decision in the ensuing elections. Congress will extend its complete support to the cause of farmers on all fronts in their fight for justice, he reiterated.
Calling the Dadupur Nalvi Project as the ‘life line of the northern Haryana’, he said that this anti-people decision of the Government would deprive the one lakh hectare land in 225 villages of Ambala, Yamunanagar and Kurukshetra districts of essential irrigation resources.
On the other hand, Indian National lok Dal has also condemned the Government’s move and demanded withdrawal of the notification. The INlD, which has been undertaking ‘Jal Yudh’ on the farmers’ issues including construction of Sutlej Yamuna link (SYl) canal, Dadupur Nalvi project, has already announced ‘Haryana Bandh’ on August 18.
While a delegation of Congress and farmers’ unions had earlier met President Ram Nath Kovind, a delegation of INlD had met Union Ministers to demand withdrawal of Government’s decision of de-notifying the canal project.
The farmers’ unions in Yamunanagar held a protest against the Government’s move to de-notify the project and also warned of approaching the High Court over the issue.
Notably, Haryana cabinet had in September 2017 approved the denotification of 1,019 acres acquired for Dadupur-Nalvi Irrigation Scheme.
While the BJP Government had justified its decision of scraping the project stating that the three decades old irrigation project was not found feasible, various farmers’ outfits and opposition parties had termed the decision as “anti-farmer”.
The Dadupur Nalvi irrigation project was initiated in year 1985 and it was approved by Government for Rs 13 crores for irrigation and recharging of ground water in the Yamunanagar, Kurukshetra and Ambala districts.
Under this, 2246.53 acre land was to be acquired for construction of this project, out of which a total of 1019.2994 acre land was acquired.