Water woes spark protest in Nurpur

Enraged over the prolonged failure of water supply in Nurpur town, residents led by former minister and ex-MLA Rakesh Pathania staged a protest march against the Jal Shakti Department (JSD) on Saturday. The demonstration began from Niazpur and moved through local markets before culminating outside the office of the Executive Engineer (XEN) at Chogan.

The protesters, carrying placards and raising slogans, expressed their anger over the JSD’s failure to restore piped water supply for the past 15 days. They also gheraoed the XEN office for nearly half an hour. Slogans of “Arjun Mahajan Amar Rahe” echoed through the protest, as residents remembered 24-year-old Arjun, a young social worker who lost his life on Thursday. Arjun reportedly suffered a fatal electric shock while arranging a motor pump to drain water from a private tank during the crisis, intensifying local resentment.

To prevent any untoward incident, a police force was deployed at the site, with the DSP and SHO of Nurpur personally monitoring the situation. Addressing the officials, a visibly agitated Pathania accused the JSD of insensitivity and negligence, alleging that officials failed to respond to distress calls during the two-week crisis. He squarely blamed the department for Arjun’s tragic death.

In response, XEN Anand Baloria assured the protesters that water supply had been restored in most areas of Nurpur on Saturday morning and that the remaining pockets would receive supply shortly. Municipal Council president, vice-president, and several councillors also joined the agitation, lending political weight to the protest.

Later, speaking to mediapersons, Pathania targeted the Congress government, accusing it of step-motherly treatment towards the Nurpur region. He claimed that the area had been reduced to an “unclaimed assembly segment,” where major development projects had been stalled. “Indoor stadium, mother-child hospital, civil hospital expansion, government college building, synthetic track, and shopping complex—all projects have been kept in cold storage. Not a single brick has been laid for development in the past two-and-a-half years,” he said.

Residents warned of intensifying their agitation if water supply issues were not permanently resolved.