Volunteers begin plugging Dhusi Bundh breach

Tribune News Service

Deepkamal Kaur

Shahkot (Jalandhar), July 11

Undeterred by the strong current in the mighty Sutlej, hundreds of volunteers of environmentalist and Rajya Sabha MP Balbir Singh Seechewal got down into deep waters to plug the breach in Dhusi Bundh at Nasirpur village this evening.

Two breaches in the bundh including one at Gatta Mundi Kasu had led to the flooding of 15 villages of Shahkot around last midnight.

Over 100 volunteers and youth from surrounding villages had got together at the breach site around 7 am today and had begun filling bags with sand brought by the kar sewa team of Seechewal. More than 200 bags had been filled by the evening. These were loaded on an iron mesh in the evening which was lowered into the breach site to fill up the gap.

The filling of bags is likely to continue 24x7 so as to ready them to plug the 125 feet wide breach in the shortest possible time which could be a week to 10 days.

Not just Seechewal, even AAP Jalandhar Lok Sabha MP Sushil Rinku joined hands to fill up these bags. As all this had begun to happen, the staff from the Drainage Department was nowhere to be seen.

Among those filling up the bags were boys as young as 16 years and some elderly even upto the age of 60. Abhay Azad, a student of Plus One and a kabaddi player taking training at an academy in Seechewal village, was happily doing sewa. Elderly Malkiat Singh (60) of Kotla village said, “I want to do my bit by helping the marooned villagers in whatever way possible.”

Joining them was Simranjit Singh of the affected Gidderpindi village. “I had invested Rs 12.5 lakh to sow paddy on 18 acres of my fields. It all is submerged since this morning. The volume of river is a clear indication that the water is not going to recede any time soon. This bundh can also take two to three weeks. Even if everything gets settled in a month and my fields have 10 inch waters left by then, I will be able to sow paddy again or else there will be no earning for the next six months,” he said.

Several residents from surrounding villages, members of NGO Akal Aid and gurdwaras in Dalla village and other areas extended a helping hand to the villagers by bringing langar, lassi, bread, tea, biscuits and bottled drinking water. They also took the langar vehicles to the lanes of Kakkar Kalan and other villages offering eatables to those camping on highways with their animals.

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