For 34 long years, the Ans canal project, which was expected to irrigate a large area of arable lands in Rajouri district, has been faced with chequered history. The project had to go through a maze of official formalities and intricacies, and was delayed till a time that the cost expenditure escalated about a thousand per cent. Originally project report for Ans Irrigation Canal in Rajouri district was prepared in 1981 and administrative approval was accorded for an amount of Rs 447 lakh. It was proposed to draw 120 cusecs of water from Ans River (Right Bank) downstream of foot suspension bridge on old Kandi-Budhal Road. Normally, when a plan of digging a canal through somewhat difficult terrain is brought under consideration, the purpose of irrigating the acreage quantum alone has not to be taken as the decisive criterion. There are a number of other pre-requisites that have to be taken into account. The topography of the area through which the canal will pass, the tunneling prospects and alignment etc. have also to be considered.
Complicacies, official as well as technical that cropped up in executing the project all these years should have been taken into notice before the blue print of the project was given a nod. The reasons now given for long delay in bringing the project to completion are not actually tenable unless these speak of irresponsibility of the officials and the policy planners that approved the blue print. Since the cost of construction has escalated a thousand times, who is to be held responsible for the delay and escalation of cost. Engineers and policy planners of the day will try to steer clear of their responsibility and they will pass the buck to others. This is outrageous and should be taken as serious dereliction of duty. According to the reports, it is said that the entire project was afflicted with serious flaws from very beginning. There was some serious problem with the drift at exit channel and the work was abandoned in March 1991. Then there cropped up the problem of contractors not willing to bid for the project. Somehow one contractor was engaged who had quoted Rs 43.80 crore. Finally, credentials of ECI Engineering and Construction Co Ltd and SRM Contractor Private Ltd) were ascertained and the matter was placed before the State Level Contract Committee. Although the project has been allocated to the bidder but there are many questions and it is still doubted if the canal can be completed in next three years.
This is a sordid example of total irresponsibility of the Government and its concerned agonies in conducting developmental affix the State. If it takes 34 years to dig a canal and even after the intention is declared of taking up the backlog, what guarantee is there that project will be brought to completion within the stipulated time. Nothing better will speak about the lackadaisical attitude of the Department of Irrigation than the story of this project. The Chief Minister, after knowing the fate of this project and its delay for three decades and more, has ordered that the project be taken up in hand without further delay. We welcome the decision but the people of the area have doubts whether the project will ever see the light of the day. Rajouri district is a backward area and how can we claim to be serious about the development of the backward areas of the State. We are surprised why the Assembly members from Rajouri or the MPs from this constituency did not raise the issue all these thirty-four years. Why the project was left to the departmental wrangling and fault finding policy. It is in fitness of things if departmental inquiry is ordered into the case and the reason for delay known to the authorities so that in similar project now under implementation or to be undertaken in future same difficulties and bottlenecks will not be met with.
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