VELLORE:Around 100 residents of Idayanchathu, the 46th Ward of Vellore Corporation,along with the Ward Councilor, G Muthuswamy, petitioned the district administration during Monday’s Grievance Meeting to lay charges against the man who has drilled more than four borewells in his land and has been selling the water after transporting them in tractors.
Thangavelu, the owner of the land, allegedly draws 200 tractor loads of water per day, each load containing 2,000 litres from his land which is adjacent to the residential area.
The residents claim that because of this, corporation and household borewells have dried up. “This is the third time, we have been here to petition the Collector, but still no action has been taken,” said a resident of Idayanchathu.
They claimed that their repeated pleas to the corporation engineering officials and mayor P Karthiyayini have gone in vain. “We have been protesting against Thangavelu, who has been drawing excess water from his borewells and selling the water through tractors for years. When we opposed and questioned Thangavelu, he says that he knows how to handle the corporation officials or other officials,” said Udayakumar, a resident of the locality.
Thangavelu, residents claim has some influence over the officials. “If there is a inspection by local body officials, he stops drawing water for three or four days and resumes drawing water afterwords,” a resident claimed.
“Thangavelu is abusing the residents in filthy language and asked us to complain to whomsoever we want to. The area has been declared as being over-exploited area but still people like Thangavelu are destroying our natural resource. I have asked corporation officials for a very long time to take action but in vain,” said the 46th Ward Councillor, Muthuswamy.
