SUFFICIENT SAMAL BARRIAGE WATER SUPPLY TO INDUSTRIES… FARMERS DEPRIVED TO GET WATER FOR CULTIVATION
Dhiramohan Ray,Odishabarta
No matter how much industry is needed, there is no need for agriculture.
TALCHER,(25/06/25):Samal Barrage is built on the river Brahmani in Samal under Kaniha Block of Angul district is providing water to the factories and industries. However, the farmland is not getting water. Farmers are unhappy about this. The Odisha State Government built the Samal Barrage in the year 1979. The aim of the barrage was to provide water to the agricltural fields of the farmers of Angul, Dhenkanal, Jajpur and Cuttack districts through two canals. However, it has become a kind of farce. Various factories and industries built in the district are being provided with ample water from the Samal Barrage. However, the farmers whose farmland is not getting water have complained that if the barrage is built in Samal, the Talcher and Kaniha areas will develop and people will be employed, and the people who will take water to the agricultural land will earn their livlihood by farming. While the local people have such hopes, it became now a farce.
Sources said, the people of the local areas lost their fertile soil due to the barrage. The government has not provided any facilities to the people of the flooded area till date. Even the people’s farmlands are not supplied with Samal Barriage water.
The land provided by the barrage during the displacement was like a conch shell thrown into the sea. Some people were displaced and resettled in the forested hilly areas, but even the most basic amenities were not provided.
The Water Resources Department has initiated the arrangement to provide water to the agricultural land through the left side and right side canals of the Samal Barrage. Left side canalis built for 1 lakh 14 thousand 3 hundred hectares of land within 141 km of Angul, Dhenkanal, Jajpur and Cuttack districts and 131 km of Angul, Dhenkanal, Athagarh and Cuttack districts through the South Side Canal.
A plan was made to irrigate 1,21,020 hectares of land in between. The land within 5 km 8 meters of Angul district was to be irrigated by two branch canals from the left side canal. However, since the construction of the canal has not been completed, water cannot reach the fields. Similarly, it was planned that 12 branch canals from the right side canal will provide water to the agricultural land. But even after years, only 30 percent of the canal construction has been completed till date. The canal is being dried up in the name of excavation. Lakhs of rupees are being spent on this. However, it is alleged that the farmers are not getting any benefit from it. The farmers demanded that the state government has taken immediate steps to provide Samal Barriage water to the cultivated lands of the periferal areas in the district of Angul.
