Bill soon to prevent illegal drawing of water by farmers

BENGALURU: State government is bringing in a stringent law to take action against farmers who draw water illegally from the canals using pump-sets. Water Resources and Minor Irrigation Minister D K Shivakumar said a bill will be brought in to prevent water theft. 

He was speaking after inaugurating a workshop on “Focused attention on vulnerable and overexploited areas’’ organised by National Water Mission in association with Department of Water Resources, Government of Karnataka.  He said the state is spending 18,000 crore on the Yettinahole project which will help in getting water to various districts in the state. 

“Most of these districts do not have a river and people are waiting for the project to be completed,” he said while praising Kolar for its utilisation of water.  

“But, while water is flowing from the Nethravathi, farmers will draw water from the canal using their hand-pump machines.There is a need to prevent them from doing this. We have formed a committee that will have official representation from water resources, police and power supply departments and it will draft the bill and we will make sure to take stringent action against water theft,’’ Shivakumar said.

Build more check dams
Minister Shivakumar offered panchayats a scheme to construct more check dams at their place and said that those who construct the highest number dams will get Rs 1 crore. “We will select two panchayats from each district. They can construct at private or government land,” he added.