Residents hold protest, want sand-laden vehicles stopped

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, February 21

Residents of about seven villages of Shahkot are sore over indiscriminate mining taking place along the Sutlej bed in the flood-prone belt.

Residents from Burewal, Danewal, Hathiana, Baupur Bet, Baupur Khurd, Rampur, Fakruwal, Langewal, Sahlapuyr and Sandhawal said they had approached the district administration in this regard but to no avail.

They said poclain machines were being used at the site against the orders which had deepened the trenches far beyond the permissible khud area.

Ram Singh, former sarpanch of Burewal village, has said: “Mining officials have allowed the khud area of only 3 acres but the work is being done on 20 acres of the riverbed. Though the river is largely dry around this time, during rainy season we will be at great risk. Our villages had got flooded about a decade ago and we do not want a repeat of that. When we approached the DC, he immediately asked the SDM and mining officials to intervene but to no avail.”

Karamjit Singh, sarpanch of Sandhewal village, said since the mining office had shifted with the Drainage Department, they requested officials to visit the site for inspection. “As XEN, Drainage, Ram Rattan, came to the site, he too admitted that the site had been wrongly given as a khud as the area is flood-prone. Every year, the department is spending lakhs of rupees to strengthen the bandh, which now passed in a curved shape through the land of farmers. We told him that if mining goes on, this bandh too could collapse in the coming months. But he gave us no assurance”, they rued.

Fed up, the residents said they held a dharna at the site two days ago and did not allow the sand-laden tractor-trailers to return.

“But the contractor eventually called up the police, who got the way cleared from us,” they alleged.