Cadres of Communist Party of India, along with residents of Othakadai, staged a hunger strike on Monday, condemning the action of diverting stagnant drainage water in and around the Madurai Bench of Madras High Court campus into the Rajagambeeram tank on Tirumogur Road.
The protesters claimed that the tank was almost full with sewage water and its bund could be breached or it would overflow if the letting of drainage water into the tank continued. They also alleged that the quality of groundwater in the nearby areas had already shown signs of deterioration.
According to them, the issue started when the Madurai Bench of Madras High Court recently registered its disappointment with Madurai district administration over the continuous accumulation of drainage water on acres of vacant low-lying land to the opposite and adjacent sides of its campus.
Swinging into action, the district administration set up a mechanism to pump the stagnant sewage water into a drainage canal, which in turn, took the water to the tank.
“This is a hasty decision. To address the problem at one place, they cannot create new problems in another place. Is it not reasonable to expect the officials to come up with a sustainable way to address the problem,” said K. Kalidas, district secretary of Communist Party of India and former president of Othakadai panchayat. “A few days back we had a meeting with Tahsildar and Block Development Officer. However, they could not provide any suggestions to address the issue. Hence, we decided to stage a fast,” he said.
Madurai East MLA P. Moorthy, belonging to DMK, also met Collector K. Veera Raghava Rao, urging his immediate intervention to resolve the issue.
While the protesters alleged that the sewage water, earlier stagnating near Madurai Bench of Madras High Court, was coming from different areas of Madurai Corporation, Corporation Commissioner S. Aneesh Sekhar told The Hindu that the Corporation had nothing to do with the problem. “The stagnating water was from Othakadai panchayat,” he said.
Stating that the apprehensions of the protesters that the tank would soon overflow or breach as unfounded, Collector Rao said that the drainage water from several areas of Othakadai panchayat was already being let inside the tank.
“However, I have instructed the officials to thoroughly study the situation and explore the feasibility of diverting the drainage water into Corporation drainage network, as requested by the villagers. If feasible, we would implement it at the earliest,” he said.
