Joshimath (U'khand): The Joshimath Bachao Sangharsh Samiti on Monday demanded scrapping of NTPC's Tapovan-Vishnugad hydel project and asked the Centre to take over the relief and rehabilitation works in the land subsidence hit-town, accusing the Uttarakhand government of carrying them out at a snail's pace.
Joshimath Bachao Sangharsh Samiti (JBSS) convenor Atul Sati, in a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, accused the state government of ignoring its warnings about the imminent disaster for 14 months and dealing with it now at a slow pace. The letter has been signed by Sati, who is credited with bringing the crisis into focus, Congress MLA from Badrinath, Rajendra Bhandari and around a dozen activists of the Samiti.
"The crisis has endangered the very existence of a historic town, but the relief and rescue operations being carried out by the state government are devoid of any urgency," it said. "We demand from the Prime Minister that the relief-rehabilitation and stabilisation work in Joshimath is taken over by the Centre to secure the lives and interest of people," the letter said.
Joshimath, the gateway to famous pilgrimage sites like Badrinath and Hemkund Sahib and international skiing destination Auli, appears on the edge of a precipice with gaping cracks appearing on buildings, roads and public facilities. The state government faces an uphill task providing relief and rehabilitating the affected families in brutal winter.
The Samiti also demanded the scrapping of NTPC's Tapovan-Vishnugad hydel project, holding the building of its tunnel responsible for the current crisis in Joshimath. It said L&T company was initially building the tunnel for the National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC), but had to quit as it was not satisfied with the way the corporation worked. The letter also mentioned a research paper published in an international journal in 2015 which said the tunnel was dug in the "fault zone".
"Percolation of water in the area began after a tunnel boring machine (TBM) got stuck during the building of the tunnel and due to the pressure of water, fresh cracks appeared on the rocks and the old ones widened," says the research paper, adding that extensive grouting of cracks in the area had been suggested, but NTPC did not do so to save expenses.
JBSS activists reiterated that NTPC's Tapovan-Vishnugad hydel project should be scrapped immediately and a fine, which is the double of the project's total investment cost, be imposed on it. "An amount of Rs 20,000 crore recovered from the company should be distributed among people displaced by the NTPC project," the letter mentioned.
Residents of the town should be compensated on a home-for-home and land-for-land formula and a high-powered committee, including locals and Sangharsh Samiti members, should be set up for the construction of a new and modern Joshimath, it further said. The NTPC, however, has maintained that its project had no role in the region's subsidence.
The signatories to the letter also claimed that the land of locals was acquired by the Ministry of Defence in 1962, but the compensation is yet to reach the beneficiaries. "These lands are also now in danger so people from whom they were acquired should be compensated according to market rate," it added. (PTI)
