Silvester D' Souza
Daijiworld Media Network – Kundapur (EP)
Kundapur, Mar 24: While the left side canal of Varahi dam had cracked and went unattended, hundreds of acres of fertile land were destroyed last week. This week again, the canal developed a breach at the same spot, on Thursday, March 23. This only shows that the project worth thousands of crores is progressing at snails pace in an unscientific manner.
A huge fracture was formed in the canal at Varahi left banks, Koikadi Kelahebbagilu at 26 kilometres early morning at 6.30 am on Friday, March 17. The water in the damaged canal gushed out and entered agricultural land and houses causing heavy destruction. However, Varahi officials did not respond to it soon. Repairs were taken up after laying bed for the last three days. The work had continued till about 8.30 pm on Thursday, March 23.
“As the water in the canal started flowing again at night, the canal broke over again,” alleged the locals. “In the morning, water entered the house of Baby Shetty, at Kelahebbagilu. There was no other damage as the incident took place in the morning. It would have been disastrous had it happened at night," said the residents of the house. The gushing water entered the well after making its way through the house, making water therein mucky. The incident caused a forced scarcity of drinking water for the residents of the house.
Manjunath Shetty, a local, said that there was a fear of forest animals and reptiles before the dam was built. "However after water started flowing in Varahi canal there is fear of it breaking down anytime. Scientifically, there should have been at least one distribution canal at a distance of every four kilometres on main canal to reduce the pressure considerably. The absence of such distribution canal from 21st to 30th kilometre has caused the problems causing increased pressure of water making it break,” he added.
Locals remain apprehensive of the canal breaking in more places if the situation continues.