Farmers in the tail-end areas of the Tungabhadra Left Bank Canal (TLBC), who were waiting for the last one month for water to reach their land for taking up paddy transplantation, suffered a blow on Tuesday as the canal breached in the 68th-mile stretch near Maski town.
According to reports, a ‘bhonga’ (hole) developed in the canal’s 68th-mile stretch where an aqueduct has been built, in the early hours of Tuesday. This eventually led to a breach in the embankment a few hours later.
When officials from the Sirwar division of the Irrigation Central Zone, Munirabad, reached the spot, water gushing from the canal had flooded the paddy fields nearby. Efforts made to plug the breach using sandbags went in vain.
The officials then initiated measures including reducing the rate at which water was being released into the TLBC from the Tungabhadra reservoir by 1,000 cusecs, increasing the quantum of water being released into the distributaries and sub-canals in the upper reaches of the TLBC, and diverting water to the escape canal at 60th mile point.
Mallikarjun Gunge, Chief Engineer, Irrigation Central Zone, visited the spot by 1 p.m.
The work on repairing the embankment began in the evening.
Chamarasa Malipatil, State president of the Karnataka Rajya Raitha Sangha, who visited the spot, told The Hindu , “It is unfortunate that the embankment has been damaged even after the renovation of the entire canal by spending around Rs. 1,500 crore. A huge breach had occurred at the same spot in 2001. The fact that the concrete wall constructed to plug the breach did not last for 14 years says a lot about the quality of the work done in 2001.”
The stopping of the water in the canal is expected to further delay paddy transplantation in over 2.5 lakh acres of land in the tail-end areas.
