Tulshi village in Solapur where villagers, fed up with water shortages, put up signs announcing their settlement was “for sale”
Pune: The drought-hit village of Tulshi, in Maharashtra’s Solapur district, can now expect some relief from its 25-year-old water crisis, after rural development and panchayati raj minister, Jaykumar Gore, promised residents a pipeline by January. The village is a mere 9km from the Sina-Madha lift irrigation project, but in 25 years of the project’s existence, Tulshi has never received a drop of water from it. This year, with over 45 days of no rainfall, anger has peaked across the village.
Gore’s visit to the village on Saturday — he’s also Solapur’s guardian minister — came days after TOI (on Sept 28) reported on a protest by Tulshi residents, who put up signs announcing their entire settlement, spanning 2,700 hectares, was “up for sale”. Gore said the govt now aims to fix the problem. And it is indeed a serious problem,” he said, acknowledging that while surrounding villages have received water through pipelines from Sina-Madha water project, Tulshi “has been ignored for decades”.
Tulshi’s water shortage is acute. “The chief minister has taken cognisance of Tulshi’s water crisis. He asked me to inspect the ground reality here.
Karthikeyan told villagers the irrigation department had conducted a hydrological survey and that a proposal for a canal network would be submitted to the state government. It was based on his statement that villagers relented, eventually taking down the “for sale” signs. Tulshi sarpanch Sharad More said one immediate benefit of a pipeline would be the recharging of the Bhavani percolation lake, which has dried up this year.
The minister’s visit also came days after Solapur district collector S Karthikeyan’s survey in Tulshi.
We are determined to resolve Tulshi’s water crisis,” Gore said. “As directed by the CM, all permissions will be given to the closed pipeline project. Work will be completed by Jan next year.