Indiscriminate sand mining causes water shortage

Sand is being lifted illegally from Peddavagu

Lifting sand indiscriminately from the streams and rivulets has led to loss of their water storage capacity and a drop in the ground water table in most places in the district, resulting in water shortage both for human and forest animals.

The Peddavagu, for instance, which was a perennial river in the Sirpur (T) constituency, and a major source of drinking water table, fell to 9.6 m in February compared to 8 m in the corresponding period last year.

The drinking water shortage is acute in the tribal areas in the Utnoor and Nirmal divisions compared to other parts of the district.

Majority of the streams and rivulets have dried up much before the summer as they have lost water storage capacity due to indiscriminate sand mining.

Sand mining has been rampant in the river Godavari from Basar to Chennur for many years now, with the sand mafia indirectly controlling the sand business and mining operations in the district.

This has been so desperate the state government’s introduction of the legal auction of sand reachers and officials sale of sand.

Sand mafia is indirectly controlling the sand business and mining in the district. The indiscriminate sand mining was going on unabatedly though the state government introducing legal auction of sand reaches and official sale of sand.

Sand is being lifted from the Peddavagu even in this drought, with the officials turning a blind eye to illegal sand mining continuing in many streams and rivulets these days.

The sand mafia hold the grip on Grampanchayats and village elders by offering some amount and grampanchayats encouraging lifting sand from their streams and rivulets in the name of generating funds for the development of the villages but in turn they were losing their natural resources and becoming victim of their own greedy.

The irony is that farmers of the same grampanchayats which gave permission for lifting sand from the streams and rivulets under its purview facing drinking water problem and not getting sufficient water for their crops due to dried up agriculture wells and bore wells and incurred huge losses.

Failed borewells add to TS farmers' woes

 Deceased farmer's son Mangilal at failed borewell

Farmers digging borewells indiscriminately on their agriculture fields for water source but incurred huge loss as most of the borewells have failed to give water due to drastic fall in the ground water table due to successive drought conditions.

Story of the Rathod Yashwanthrao,50, of Kalva Thanda of Dilawarpur mandal is a classic example to how failed borewells turning into one of the reasons for farmer  suicides in Telangana.

He dug up four borewells on his agriculture fields in the last one month but did not get water. Rathod Yashwanthrao committed suicide by hanging himself to a tree close to his agriculture fields January9. 

More expenditure is being incur for digging borewells as most of the famers are going up to 400 feet deep to get water to find water due to drastic fall in the ground water table and an average farmers is spending more than Rs 25,000 each for digging borewell. This is result of lack of rain water conservation to increase ground water table.

Rathod Mangilal, son of deceased farmer Yashwanthrao who discontinued his Degree said, his father invested major share of loans he had taken from various sources invested on digging borewells with a hope that they may bring fortune but the failed borewells had ended up their family in now where.         

Telangana Vidyavanthula Vedika district president Dr U. Krishnam Raju said, ‘digging borewells was nothing but gambling and added that people investment money in both only with the hope but there was lot of uncertainty involved in it and observed that it is high time for the government to take steps for rain water conservation to improve the ground water table which will go a long way’.

Farmers are investing huge money on digging borewells on their agriculture lands and some of them become crazy of digging bore wells in the villages on seeing one another but the success rate is low when compared to Agriculture wells.

Rathod Yashwanthrao went to Dubai in search of job four years ago after he uncured huge loss in the agriculture in his four acre land and mainly he invested huge money on digging borewells. He returned one year ago just to start again agriculture.

Yashwanthrao was popular in his village as ‘crazy person of digging borewells’ with a hope that he too gets water for his fields like his neighbors but he could not succeed in his efforts.  

Villagers say Yashwanthrao dug up more than 20 borewells in his agriculture fields in the last 15 years. He had taken loan Rs 98,000 from local bank and Rs 5 lakh loan from private money lender.

State relaxes water rule for Dalit bastis

To give a boost to the Dalit Basti Scheme, the state government has relaxed the norms regarding ‘availability of water sources’ (sufficient ground water) which was must for land purchase under the scheme.

Few acres of land so far distributed to the Dalits under this scheme. The revenue officials should purchase the lands only after confirming that there was enough ground water to cultivate the land to be distributed to the Dalits.

Till date, the department of Ground Water would conduct tests on the lands to be purchased for the Dalit Basti scheme and thus many lands were rejected due to lack of ground water resulting from drought conditions in the last two years.

Collector M. Jagan Mohan said that state government has given permission to the district to purchase land without taking the ground water table into consideration as most of the crops in the district are rain fed and ground water table doesn’t make much difference in cultivating these crops.

There had been a slowdown in the implementation of the Dalit Basti Scheme for a while  as there some irregularities in purchasing land in Mancherial and Sirpur (T) Assembly Constituencies, said the collector, adding that some of the people had hiked the land price to Rs 6 lakh per acre, which was actually purchased for Rs 3 land acre, before selling to the government.

So far, 673 acre purchased at Rs 22.8 crore, has been distributed to 230 beneficiaries under Dalit Basti in the district.      

It has come to light that some government land was also purchased for the scheme as sellers and officials had colluded at some places.

Officials concerned had rejected hundreds of acres of land identified at various places based on reports given by Ground Water department, stating that there was no availability of ground water sources. Now 2,000 acre of land has become available for purchase and distribution under Dalit Basti in the Adilabad district.

The Ground Water department had cleared 1,026 acre by the end of August for purchase in the district. Most land was purchased in Jainad, Tasmi , Talamadugu, Bela, Kagaznagar, Bajarhatnoor, Kubheer, Kotapalli and Sarangapoor mandals in the district.

Dalit leaders say that state government’s decision to relaxed norms on availability of ground water to purchase lands may not be serve the real purpose of the scheme aimed to distribute 3 acre of cultivable land and taking the advantage of this officials may purchase barren lands for Dalits at cheaper prices and hike the prices on paper.    

Telangana SC Cooperative Finance Corporation vice- chairman B. Jayaraj inspected the lands purchased in Kubheer mandal for Dalit Basti and found them not useful for cultivation and also found irregularities in purchasing those lands.

GPs are trying to outdo each other

Grampanchayats are vying with each other to become the best as it gets the attention of the government and funds in the Telangana.

Bandalnagapu, a sleepy village in Tamsi mandal of Adilabad district five years ago, looks like a town today with its posh colorful roads. With the support of the local youth, seniors in the village and government funds it has transformed into a model to emulate.

The villagers laid two- lane main road, internal CC roads in the village with solar lights and colorful dividers in the middle. Gram panchayats are getting funds directly from the central government unlike in the past and Rs 20 crore has been released to the GPs for 2015-16 under 14^th Finance Commission.

The village has good buildings for Gampanchayat and youth Association. The grampanchayats have laid gravel roads to the agriculture fields and constructed few culverts on the local streams and rivulets. The Bandalnagapur and Savargoan hamlet is having population of 1,500.

L T Veena of Bandalnagapur said their villagers are unitedly taking up development activities in the village unlike in the past and the good roads and buildings are any indication of combined effort.

She expressed happiness over development taking place in the village and people focusing on development keeping aside their differences aside and their party affiliations aside.

The villagers say that Mattadivagu project constructed at Vaddadi village has changed the face the village and brought richness in terms of wealth to the village changing their cropping patterns.

Earlier villagers used to cultivate only one crop now they are cultivating two with the irrigation water and proper canals to the agriculture fields. The elected public representatives Sarpanch Gangula Venkanna and MPP Manjula Reddy of the village are concentrating to ensuring every family has a toilet to encourage hygienic sanitation issues.

Udari Narayana, government teacher of the village said the village had 60 percent ISL currently and soon they would achieve 100 percent and observed that now farmers are getting 15 quintals cotton yield an average with irrigation facility against 6 quintals in acre in the past.

Area of vegetable cultivation has increased due to increase in ground water table due to project and also milk business has increased manyfold in the last four years. These positive developments boosted the education.

Twenty students of the village are studying in corporate colleges and some of them doing engineering in Hyderabad.

Narayana observed that Pochera Bridge constructed on the local stream has improved road connectivity to the village and it played a role in the development of the village but unexpected wealth has increased the liquor consumption in the village.

Farmer suicides: Telangana to promote check dams

State government will promote check dams to increase the ground water table, and help in preventing farmer distress in the Telangana.

The check dams will be constructed on rivulets and streams along with the bridges to improve the ground water table to save standing crops during drought in order to prevent farmer suicides in the Telangana state.

Panchayatraj and Roads and buildings departments have to inform the irrigation department while they were constructing bridges on rivulets and stream and even small rivers so that irrigation department construct check dams at such places.

State government has issued instruction to the Panchayatraj and R&B departments to prepare designs of the bridges on streams and rivulets consulting irrigation officials. 

Reports revealed that some farmers had fallen into debt after digging many borewells but failed to get water for agriculture due drastic fall in the ground water at many places.

The state government is of the opinion that farmers were resorting to suicides due to crop failure and subsequent debts due to crop failures during drought and following the borewells dried up following the drastic fall in ground water table.

Borewells they dug goes dry within no time and this was resulted in low yields even after investing huge amounts in digging borewells.

State government found that water from rivulets and streams flowing downstream without any use and enters into sea at last. At many places, there were no check dams on rivulets and streams especially hilly areas and water flows to down stream.

It is also found that overflowing water from tanks goes downstream without any check and go waste but things become worst during summer when there were no rains or scanty rainfall.      

Minister for irrigation T. Harish Rao said ‘they were going to promote check dams on big scale in the state and construct check dams near Swarna irrigation project in Mudhole in the Adilabad to improve the ground water table for agriculture purposes and said state government will give nine hours uninterrupted power to agriculture from next Kharif’.

State government is making serious efforts to install new electric transformers and set up power sub-station to give uninterrupted power supply to the agriculture in future.