Residents of Mehma Sarja village protest against sarpanch

BATHINDA: Residents of Mehma Sarja village on Friday staged a protest against sarpanch of the village for allegedly not taking the requisite action on time to ensure that rainwater diverted by other villages do not enter residential areas and fields of the village.

Residents of Mehma Sarja village protest near the bus stand in Bathinda on Friday. Tribune photo

Tribune News Service

Bathinda, July 19

Residents of Mehma Sarja village on Friday staged a protest against sarpanch of the village for allegedly not taking the requisite action on time to ensure that rainwater diverted by other villages do not enter residential areas and fields of the village.

The protesting residents raised slogans against the sarpanch and demanded that administration must take appropriate action to address the matter. The residents of the village alleged that farmers from other villages diverted rainwater towards their village, leaving not only fields but residential areas inundated for past two days.

The residents of village also alleged that had the sarpanch of Mehma Sarja taken note of it and forbade letting the drained rainwater enter in the village then they would not have been subjected to any inconvenience.

Gurbaksh Singh, a resident of the village said, “After incessant rain, fields of farmers in our village were already inundated with excess water but after drained out rainwater from other villages, water overflowed from fields and entered in residential areas of Mehma Sarkari and Mehma Sarja villages. Life was thrown out of gear here as residents could not move out of their houses. Hundreds of acres of agricultural land with paddy and cotton sown in it submerged in rainwater causing substantial losses to farmers.”

Residents of the village said that after incessant rain and accumulation of water in residential areas for hours, walls of around one dozen houses have developed cracks and rainwater entered inside many other houses.

Later, Station House Officer (SHO), Nehianwala police station, Rajesh Kumar along with a team of police personnel reached the spot to take stock of the situation. After Kumar agreed to take a copy of complaint regarding the problem faced by residents of the village, latter ended their protest.

Talking to Bathinda Tribune, SHO said, “Residents of Mehma Sarja village has given a complaint against the sarpanch and sought a solution to the waterlogging problem in their fields and residential area. We need to go through the complaint thoroughly and further action in the matter would be taken after investigation.”