Jharkhand villagers help themselves by building a canal - India News and Travel Times Provides India-centric and other News and Features

Residents of Bariatu, a less-known village of 170 households in Ranchi district had wanted a canal to meet their irrigational and other needs for along time. Probably, over the past couple of decades, they must have submitted umpteen representations to the concerned authorities for the laying of such a canal. Sad to say, all their pleas did fall on deaf ears and recently the villagers thought that enough was enough. Thus in the absence of government's assurance and assistance, they collectively resolved to take up this project on their own and mobilised able bodied workers to execute this canal project. So much so, even children came forth to render their service in digging and laying of a canal linked to a nearby river. Indeed, their consistent, committed and collective efforts have fetched the desired results and the canal running nearly two kilometres in length is all set to irrigate the fields in and around Bariatu. It took these volunteers around 18 months to complete this canal project despite several odds such as difficult topography and lack of appropriate earth digging implements. The population of Bariatu is predominantly tribal and development projects, which are planned, are usually left to gather dust in the files of district and state administration. "The canal will irrigate and make our fields, 1000 acres or thereabouts, productive.We would grow, vegetables, cereals, we will practically grow everything from potato and chillies to wheat." said Mungaeshwar Singh, a villager. Now, the villagers of Bariatu are beaming a smile since soon the canal would irrigate their fields and alleviate poverty. People in Jharkhand's isolated and remote interior areas face plethora of problems including left extremist violence.