NAGAPATTINAM : The theft of regulator shutters in the district came to the fore again after farmers raised the issue with the collector at the recently-held monthly grievance redressal meeting. They complained that this affected water distribution through channels for irrigation and other purposes.
According to the PWD-WRD, shutters of water regulators were stolen in at least 31 places across the district over the past three years. While sources said miscreants target the shutters worth lakhs of rupees for its metal which are then sold off in scrap shops, farmers said their theft affected water distribution whenever River Cauvery water was released from Mettur dam. 'Cauvery' V Dhanabalan of Kaviri Vivasaayigal Paathukaapu Sangam said, "Whenever and wherever the shutters go missing, the WRD is unable to control the water discharge through channels. It affects the distribution of water intended for places where cultivation is taken up. Without irrigation, our cultivation takes a hit."
While cases over their theft have been registered in police stations across the district based on the complaints of PWD officials, the suspects in several of them are yet to be arrested and the stolen shutters, recovered. G Kamalakannan, WRD executive engineer (Nagapattinam), said, “The miscreants mainly steal from the water regulators in A, B,C and D channels in rural areas where our monitoring is low as compared to the regulators in distributaries.”
The theft of regulator shutters found place among the grievances raised by farmers in the monthly redressal meeting at the district collectorate on Wednesday. Officials from police stations across the district were summoned to the meeting and made to answer the delay in tracing the missing regulator parts and arresting those behind the thefts. Collector Johny Tom Varghese also directed the police to investigate the cases thoroughly and solve them. Meanwhile, Kamalakannan said, “We are taking steps for the replacement of shutters soon after they go missing in order to ensure water distribution and irrigation."