National
Water enters Tehri town
By Our Staff Correspondent
TEHRI, DEC. 7. The second phase of construction of the controversial Tehri Dam project has started with the beginning of the submergence of this township by the waters of the Bhagirati.
The `Chipko' movement leader, Mr. Sunderlal Bahuguna, who had been camping near the main bridge leading to the town shifted to a higher place today as water entered his ``kutiya''.
Mr. Bahuguna, who has been opposing the dam for over two decades now, wished that the authorities had waited for a decision in the two cases pending before the Supreme Court before flooding the town. The issue is one of ``gross violation of human rights'' and a case is pending before the National Human Rights Commission also, he said.
Mr. Bahuguna has been on a fast against construction of the high-rise dam in this highly-seismic and fragile region for 195 days on five occasions spread between 1989 and 2001. Although he has not been able to get the project scrapped, his crusade has helped in double-checking the project parameters and effecting suitable modifications.
According to the district administration officials, efforts are on to shift the persons still living in the town to new places where they had been provided alternative accommodation or plots. The Valmiki Basti was shifted on Thursday and the local people had been allowed to use the bridge to walk across to safety. No vehicles are allowed on the bridge as it is too weak to take heavy loads.
About 14,000 persons living in the Old Tehri town, 28 villages that will be totally submerged and 81 villages that will be partially submerged will have to be rehabilitated before the dam is commissioned in the next few years.
Although the Tehri Hydro Development Corporation claims to have rehabilitated most of the Old Tehri population and some of the rural people, the Uttaranchal chapter of the People's Union of Civil Liberties (PUCL) has alleged that the compensation given to the oustees was not enough to construct new houses.
It also alleged that only a fraction of the amount shown as spent on rehabilitation went to the oustees and that the remaining was used in for constructing bungalows for senior officials or quarters for Government employees.
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