For the last 55 years, residents of five gram panchayats (GPs) in the Sharavati backwater region have been listening to politicians promising them a bridge during the elections. Most families from the Tumari, Kudarur, Sankanna Shanubagh, Channagonda, and Bhankuli gram panchayats ceded their land for the construction of a reservoir across the Sharavati river near Linganamakki in 1964.
After the Sharavati hydel power project was commissioned, the villages turned into islands in the Linganamakki reservoir backwaters. Many moved upland when their houses were submerged.
Promises of proper rehabilitation were not fulfilled, and the region remained deprived of basic amenities like healthcare and connectivity. Moreover, many villagers don’t have title deeds for the land on which they were rehabilitated.
At present, two barges provided by the Department of Ports and Inland Water Transport connect nearly 30,000 people in the five GPs. A long-standing demand of the region is a 2.16-km bridge across the Sharavati backwaters to Kalasavalli and Ambaragodlu villages, which will provide easy access to the mainland.
A sharp increase in the number of devotees visiting the Chowdeshwari temple in the Sigandur village has lately resulted in overcrowding of the barges.
Sathyanarayan G.T., president, Tumari GP, told The Hindu that local students and patients have been facing difficulty in boarding them.
In 2009, the State government gave the nod for the construction of a bridge at an estimated cost of ₹164.59 crore. However, the project was pushed to the back-burner as officials of the Finance Department felt it was not economically viable.
On 19 February, 2018, Nitin Gadkari, Union Minister for Road Transport, Highways, Shipping and Water Resources, laid the foundation stone for the construction of a bridge.
A revised estimate said the bridge would cost ₹450 crore. The Ministry floated a tender for a project recently.
Today, B.Y. Raghavendra, BJP candidate for the Shivamogga parliamentary seat, is seeking votes claiming that the Centre took up the bridge construction work on the request of B.S. Yeddyurappa, his father and president of the BJP State unit, who was the Shivamogga MP then.
Countering this claim, Madhu Bangarappa, JD(S) candidate, is alleging that BJP leaders were trying to mislead voters over the construction of the bridge.
In the Lok Sabha elections of 2009 and 2014, and during the Assembly election in 2018, the BJP had tried to garner votes in the name of the bridge construction, he said.
Na. D’Souza, Kannada novelist who was also involved in the struggle launched by residents of the island for the construction of the bridge, told The Hindu that it has become a practice for the politicians to seek votes in the name of constructing the bridge, instead of seeing it as a responsibility of the government of the day to provide an essential amenity for the displaced people of the Sharavati hydel project.
“With a small portion of the revenue earned from power generation, the bridge can be constructed. It is apparent that all the political parties that have ruled the State so far lacked the will power for the construction of the bridge,” he said.
Mr. Sathyanarayan concurred, “In earlier campaign meetings, promises to build the bridge were greeted with huge applause. But people have lost hope now. For politicians, the bridge has become a means to secure votes.”