Modi’s foundation laying spree could be ‘election stunt’ says BJP leader

Former Speaker of Jharkhand Assembly, a former MP and a formidable BJP leader Inder Singh Namdhari wonders if the foundation stone of the Mandal dam laid by Prime Minister Narendra Modi at Barwadih (Jharkhand) on Saturday is just an ‘election stunt’.

Work on the dam had started in the seventies, 40 years ago, but slow progress was made in acquiring land and because of extremist activities. The abduction and murder of an Executive Engineer had brought the project to a grinding halt with no engineer or worker willing to venture into the area.

Following the murder of the Executive Engineer, the case was handed over to the CBI. But though the deceased engineer’s son and daughter-in-law are both IPS officers in Uttar Pradesh, no breakthrough was ever made despite suspicion that he had been killed not by Maoists but by vested interests.

Environmental objections and the insistence of the Forest Department for an equal number of trees to be planted for the felled ones caused further delay. Since the water from the dam was to be used largely in the Aurangabad district of Bihar, bifurcation of Bihar and creation of Jharkhand in 2000 also stalled the project.

But Prime Minister Modi conveniently overlooked the facts and that the BJP has been in the saddle in Jharkhand for the longest period since 2000—and launched on his by now familiar attack on the Congress, which he said had delayed the project because it had no concern for farmers.

But Namdhari, writing on his Facebook page, points out that the foundation stone laid by the PM on Saturday looked like an election stunt. Referring to the elaborate arrangements made for the PM’s visit and rally at Chianki airfield and the district administration requisitioning all school buses to ferry people, Namdhari wondered if all these efforts would help the project.

With the Model Code of Conduct before the general election coming into force within the next 10-12 weeks, he wondered if even the tender applications can be finalised before that. While he did not say this in so many words, there is apprehension that at least part of the project’s total budget of ₹2,400 Crore will be released and disbursed in a hurry before the election.

Namdhari also refers to the failure of the administration to settle issues related to compensation and rehabilitation to 1,600 displaced families. Many of the farmers, whose land was taken away forty years ago, he says, have died. Unless these issues are settled, the project, he hints, will remain uncertain.

Indeed the displaced took out a 60-Kilometre long walk before the PM’s arrival to demand assurance of water supply to farmers in Jharkhand and compensation in accordance with the provisions of the Land Acquisition Act of 2013.

But several thousand displaced families were detained by the police and were not allowed to meet the Prime Minister and hand over a memorandum. Preventive detentions kept a thousand old, women and children confined to makeshift camps.