After 90 Degree- Turn ROB, ‘Road Handpump’ In MP Village Sparks Debate
Even as the controversy over the 90 degree-turn railway over-bridge (ROB) in Bhopal barely died down, a hand pump, found almost in the middle of a road in a village in Madhya Pradesh’s Sidhi district, has become a subject of public debate in the state.
Bhopal: Even as the controversy over the 90 degree-turn railway over-bridge (ROB) in Bhopal barely died down, a hand pump, found almost in the middle of a road in a village in Madhya Pradesh’s Sidhi district, has become a subject of public debate in the state.
A video showing the locals, belonging to the primitive tribe of Baiga, drawing water from the ‘road hand pump’ has gone viral on social media leading the local administration to begin a probe into it.
The hand pump, built under the Prime Minister Janman Yojana, was found almost in the middle of the newly built road in the village of Dol Kothar, posing a threat to the lives of the local villagers.
In the viral video, the hand pump was seen standing around three-ft below the road surface while around one foot of it remained above the road.
A few cement pillars of around two feet in length, built on the road around the hand pump, served as its fencing.
Sources said that the local authorities had allegedly paid no heed to the pleas by the villagers to remove the hand pump during the construction of the road.
The hand pump could not be shifted to another place during the construction of the road since its removal did not come under the jurisdiction of the panchayat, the local panchayat secretary Motilal Saket told the visiting media.
The local sub divisional magistrate (SDM) Rakesh Shukla told the media that the video came to his notice and a probe was ordered into the matter.
Those responsible for it (not shifting the handpump) will be taken to the task, he said.
The village has ten families belonging to the Baiga tribe, declared as a primitive tribe.
The hand pump is the only source of drinking water for the local villagers.
The 90 degree-turn ROB at Aishbagh in Bhopal had a few months ago hogged limelight in the national media forcing the Madhya Pradesh government to order a probe into it.
Madhya Pradesh chief minister Mohan Yadav had then vowed not to inaugurate the ROB as long as the reported faulty design in the ROB was not corrected.
