Daijiworld Media Network – Udupi (EP)
Udupi, May 31: Even as Udupi battles severe water crisis, a Rs 270-crore scheme to bring Varahi river water to Udupi city under the centre's Amrut project was on Friday May 31 cleared by the government.
A meeting was convened by legislative council application committee to discuss the Rs 270-crore water supply scheme under the Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation (Amrut) of the union government that could provide drinking water to the entire city.
Former legislative council deputy speaker and application committee president Basavaraja Horatti presided over the meeting held on Friday May 31.
It was proposed in the project earlier that non-purified water from Varahi would be directed through pipes to the purification unit in Baje and sent to Manipal. However, as members of Raitha Sangha submitted their objection to application committee, the committee blocked the tender and conducted investigations. Meanwhile, MLA K Raghupati Bhat spoke to Raitha Sangha leaders through Pratapchandra Shetty and others and held discussions about amending the project.
A few decisions were taken up after concrete discussions on Friday. It was decided to construct a purification unit of 50 MLD at Barathkal, Varahi and supply water through pipeline directly from there to GRL, Manipal. It was also decided to distribute the purified water to all the panchayats that are situated along the way. The roads that are dug to lay pipes wherever necessary will be asphalted again.
It was also decided in the meeting to call for tenders and begin the work.
Basarvaraj Horatti asked officials to submit a report with regard to inviting tenders and commencement of work to the application committee. MLA Raghupati Bhat took active part in the meeting, explaining the problems of drinking water in Udupi and asked officials to start work immediately.
Application committee members, urban development department chief secretary Anjum Parvez, irrigation department chief secretary Rakesh Singh, KUIDFC’s M D Ibrahim, other urban development department officials and KUIDFC officials took part in the meeting.
Raghupati Bhat opined that the meeting found a solution for a problem that was troubling residents for more than a year.
Former minister Pramod Madhwaraj, who was also Udupi MLA before Raghupati Bhat, took to Twitter to announce the clearance of the project. He gave the credit to former urban development minister Vinay Kumar Sorake, Congress MLA Roshan Baig and to former Mangaluru South MLA J R Lobo, and said that he would put all efforts for successful implementation of the project.