Vadodara/Anand: A day before Gujarat chief minister (CM) Vijay Rupani is scheduled to inaugurate a water cum adventure park, touted to be India’s largest, farmers are threatening to stage protests in Anand district on Sunday.
The water park has been set up at Valvod village in Anand’s Borsad taluka. Farmers from the region are opposing the inauguration ceremony stating that at a time when they are not getting water to irrigate their dry farms, such a project will only result in wastage of water – a claim which the owners of the water park have refuted.
Ahead of inauguration ceremony, farmers of Kanvel area of Tarapur taluka have threatened to oppose the programme while Sojitra’s Congress MLA Poonam Parmar has also threatened to join them.
“Farmers are not getting the minimum support price assured to them. They are in severe pain as their paddy farms are drying up because of want of irrigation water. Naturally, they are agitated and if required I will be there to support them,” said Parmar.
Rajesh Govaliya, owner of the project, however said that 75 % land of the total 147 acres in which the park is spread will be used for tree plantation and greenery.
“The construction area covers only 25 % land. We are using water drawn from bore for the project. The water used in the pool will be reused for watering the plants and we have also set up a sewage treatment plant which too will be used for growing more trees,” he said.
“I know the value of water. We are not going to waste water in anyway. In fact, our plan is to plant one lakh trees in the next two to three years time,” he said.
He claimed that it will generate direct employment for 2,000 people in the region and indirectly 5,000 residents, including travel agents and booking agencies, will benefit from the project which in its full phase will include theme park, amusement park and other sports activities.
