Rajendra Singh Panel Says Manair Check Dams Bombed

Hyderabad: A fact-finding committee that included the ‘Waterman of India’ Rajendra Singh has concluded that the recent incidents of destruction of check dams on the Manair river were the result of deliberate use of explosives.

Addressing a press meet along with other members of the committee, Rajendra Singh said he visited the Adivi Somanpalli and Tanugula to inspect the damaged structures, and saw “holes drilled into the cement concrete structure” and that there was “clear evidence of explosives being used to destroy the checkdams.”

He said that a ‘people’s inquiry commission’ would be set up by the Jal Biradari, a group dedicated to the protection of rivers, under the leadership of a retired Supreme Court or a High Court judge as part of efforts to establish the facts related to destruction of the check dams.

Meanwhile, BRS working president K.T. Rama Rao demanded that the Congress government catch and punish the sand mafia and culprits behind planting bombs and damaging assets created after spending crores of rupees. “Rajendra Singh’s observations are a slap in the face of the Revanth Reddy government and Congress ministers who claimed that the checkdams were destroyed due to natural causes,” he said.

Asking if the Congress was running a “government or a den for gangsters,” Rama Rao asked: Why are the interests of farmers being sacrificed for profits of sand contractors.”