Madras HC disposes MLA’s plea seeking new canal

MADURAI: The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court on Thursday disposed of a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) plea filed by Alangulam MLA PH Manoj Pandian seeking the construction of a new link canal in the taluk after the Water Resources Department (WRD) of Tamil Nadu informed the proposal to create the new canal is under its priority list and would be implemented based on the policy decision taken by the government.

The petitioner wanted the construction of the new link canal to draw surplus water from the Veeranam-Kasikuvaithan supply channel for feeding the Kavalakurichi tank in Alangulam taluk of Tenkasi to solve water woes of several villages–Kavalakurichi, Vennilingapuram, Maruthamputhur, Reddiyarpatti and K.Navaneethakrishnapuram villages– which depend on the Kavalakurichi big tank for drinking and irrigation purposes.

The project was first proposed in 2019, but was later dropped without any reason, Pandian alleged. In his status report on the PIL, the executive engineer of the project planning and designs division of the department explained that there was indeed a proposal to excavate a new canal measuring 4.6 km at a cost of Rs 14.2 crore to feed the Kavalakurichi big tank and its supply channels or tanks. While the proposal was dropped in March last year, it was later reconsidered to be included in the priority list of schemes for the year with a revised estimate of Rs 16.5 crore, he added.

“The WRD has a separate ‘Plan Formulation Wing’ headed by a Chief Engineer with circles, that is headed by superintending engineers, and many divisions at different places of the state for investigating schemes relating to irrigation projects. This year, the above scheme is proposed under the priority list of schemes. It will be implemented based on the policy decision taken by the government,” the engineer said in the report. Recording this, a Bench of justices GR Swaminathan and B Pugalendhi disposed of the PIL.