Drowned In Uncertainty

The Supreme Court has given the go-ahead to the controversial Sardar Sarovar Dam to run at its full capacity. But the government is not sure who all will get submerged, let alone rehabilitate them

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UTTER CHAOS reigns over at least 176 villages and Dharampuri town in Narmada Valley. Every day, revenue officials, accompanied by platoons of police and armed with a Supreme Court order, visit these places in Badwani and Dhar districts of Madhya Pradesh and ask the residents to vacate their houses, shops, farmland, pasture land and places of worship by July 31. “Some officials even threaten that they would unleash water from the Sardar Sarovar Dam on our villages if we do not relocate by the said date,” says Vijay Marola of Nasirpur village in Dhar.

Going by the latest affidavit submitted by the Madhya Pradesh government before the Supreme Court in 2016, Marola, his old parents, infant son, wife and two younger sisters are among the 110,000 people (21,808 families) whose houses and land are likely to get submerged once the 30-odd sluice gates on the dam are closed to raise water level in the reservoir from the present 121.92 metres (m) to 138.68 m. Though the dam height was increased to 138.68 m in 2014, the dam authorities have been limiting the full reservoir level to 121.92 m to avoid submergence of the households that are yet to relocate.

On February 8, the apex court paved the way for the dam to operate at its full capacity and directed the Central and state governments to rehabilitate all project affected families by July 31.