Gaya man dug a canal for 20 years to bring water

GAYA/PATNA: Laungi Bhuiyan was 50 when he picked up a shovel to start digging an improvised canal to channel rainwater from the nearby hills to the parched fields in his remote village in Gaya district.
Nearly 20 years on, his dream project — a two-km canal — is ready and the story of his extraordinary feat has brought him countrywide fame after industrialist Anand Mahindra tweeted about him, comparing him to another hero Dasrath Manjhi, the ‘Mountain Man’.
Comparisons with Manjhi, who also toiled alone for over 20 years to carve a path through a rocky hill, are inevitable, not just because of their similar achievements but because Manjhi was also from Gaya.
Bhuiyan’s village Kothilwa under Bankebazar block in the district falls in a remote forested and hilly region which always faced acute irrigation problem, due to which most villagers migrated in search of work as farming did not produce enough.
“I used to rear goats and also collect wood from the forest to sell in the market for livelihood. But whenever got time, I took out my spade and would start levelling the soil,” said Laungi told TOI.
“I started working in 2001 and normally worked two to three hours a day. Villagers called me mad. Even my family opposed but I kept working. Now I have got an Indira Awaas unit in the village and all my four sons work in other states,” Laungi added.
Laungi said he undertook this massive exercise to ensure that the rainwater flowing down nearby hills gets tapped for irrigation.
“Many glorious monuments have been built which have involved sweat & toil over decades. But those were usually the visions of absolute monarchs using the labour of their subjects. To me, this humble canal is no less glorious than the pyramids or the Taj,” Mahindra tweeted.
The area around his village is rocky and the surface is uneven. He has carved the two-km long passage in such a way that it looks like a canal. He has also carved out some paiyns (traditional water body) to ensure rainwater reaches the farm fields.
The local administration has acknowledged Laungi’s efforts. On Tuesday, Bankebazar BDO Sonu Kumar and irrigation officials visited the site. According to sources, a detailed project report would be prepared to upgrade the canal.
The BDO told this newspaper that following the Gaya DM’s direction, a team of engineers visited the site of the canal carved out by Laungi.
“The team has conducted an inspection and assessed how the work can be developed into a better model. We have carried out the survey and a report will be submitted to the DM on Wednesday,” the BDO said.
Social activist Upendra Prasad Verma of Raniganj said, “Lot of development work has been done in the area but irrigation problem persists. But due to the effort by Laungi, around 100 acres of land in the area can be irrigated now.”
He added, “There are two rivers — Morhar and Surhar. During the rainy season water that overflowed from these rivers accumulated in traditional sources of irrigation like aahar and paiyn. But due to sand mining, the level of rivers has gone deeper than aahar and paiyn. So the rainwater was getting scattered and unutilized.”