Patrolling teams dismantle Gang Canal water's major theft network

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Earlier, a team of the Samyukt Kisan Morcha (SKM), led by Amar Singh Bishnoi, during an inspection of the Gang Canal from RD 250 to 311 near Kamalwala, Islamwala and other villages in Fazilka district had detected that locals had illegally installed solar panel-linked motors and about 1,000 plastic pipes to steal water. Due to this, only 500 cusecs of water out of 1,800 cusecs released from the Ballanwala headworks reached the Khakha headworks on the Abohar-Sriganganagar border.

The SKM brought the matter to the notice of Amarjeet Singh Mehrada, Chief Engineer (CE), Quality Control. The CE directed officials to take up the same with their Ferozepur counterparts.

Dhiraj Chawla, Superintending Engineer (SE), Sriganganagar informed Ferozepur SE that 1,833 cusecs of water were released from RD 45 Ferozepur in Gang Canal, but only 1,300 cusecs reached the Khakhan headworks indicting the water was stolen in a big way.

Sriganganagar SE nominated Assistant Engineer Vijay Kumar and Vinod Kumar, junior engineer, as members of the patrolling team and told the Ferozepur SE to form a joint patrolling team. The latter nominated four junior engineers, Vipuldeep Singh, Manvir Singh, Gobinda and Pawan Kumar, on the patrolling team.

The team, accompanied by police personnel, raided several places along the Gang Canal in the Punjab area and dismantled pipes illegally installed by locals to steal water. The second phase of action was being planned, official sources said.

The Kisan Sangharsh Samiti spokesman Subhash Sehgal said on July 22, 2021, 33 persons were booked on the allegation of organised theft of canal water. The Canal Department team had seized 80 pipes. On October 8, 2018, also, 18 farmers were booked under Sections 379, 430 and 427 of the IPC and Prevention of Damage to Public Property Act. Patrolling must be made a regular process, he said.

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A joint patrolling team of Punjab and Rajasthan officials dismantled Gang Canal water's major theft network.