Encroachment of Aratchikuppam tank goes unchecked

The tank located on an expanse of 40 acres helped in replenishing the groundwater table in the area

Not long ago, the Aratchikuppam tank in Bahour Commune Panchayat was the main source of assured irrigational facility for Aratchikuppam in Puducherry and Kanganakuppam in neighbouring Cuddalore district.

The tank located on an expanse of 40 acres helped in replenishing the groundwater table in the area, offered sanctuary to birds and was also a source of drinking water for the locals.

P. Suresh Babu, a farmer of Aratchikuppam remembers raising two crops a year using water from the Aratchikuppam tank. This was prior to 2005. After the maintenance of the tank was handed over from the Eri Sangam (Tank Association) to the Public Works Department (PWD) and Commune Panchayats, the tank started facing the onslaught of encroachment under the very nose of the Commune Panchayat and the Irrigation Wing of the PWD.

“Several farmers in Aratchikuppam were dependent on the tank for irrigation and cultivated crops such as paddy, maize, and groundnuts. However, the tank’s irrigation channels were blocked and encroached on by one person from the village, following which the irrigation supply was hit. This left the farmers with very little choice but to sink their own borewells on their lands to raise the crops,” he said.

The tank’s natural outlets have been blocked and illegal cultivation has reduced its storage capacity. According to rough estimates, about 2 hectares of the natural outlets has come under cultivation, thereby reducing its storage capacity.

“This tank has been under constant encroachment for the last two decades. The PWD’s Irrigation Wing and the Commune Panchayat officials have continuously been contacted for the removal of encroachment. During the first phase of the Tank Rehabilitation Project Puducherry (TRPP), a tank association was formed, and the association successfully evicted the encroachment inside the tank. But after 2008, since TRPP was discontinued by the PWD, fresh encroachments had again come up while officials failed to take any action against the encroacher,” said V. Chandrasekhar, president of Bangaru Vaickal Neeradhara Koottamaippu, a water users’ association.

The PWD and Bahour Commune Panchayat have miserably and wantonly allowed this to happen to alienate a priceless waterbody to an encroacher, he charged.