Ponda: Locals from Ponda, especially Nagzar Cutri, heaved a sigh of relief as the Water Resources Department (WRD) began the work of desilting the main Ponda nullah on Thursday.
Herald in its Thursday, May 28 edition had highlighted the problems faced by the locals in its story titled ‘Ponda locals fear flooding in monsoon as garbage continues to choke nullahs’.
It may be recalled that locals were demanding that the nullahs be cleaned given what had happened last year, when Nagzar Curti and other areas experienced heavy flooding. The situation was so bad that water had entered the house and reached a height of one metre, which created a lot of difficulties for the residents. These houses are located near the nullah.
The nullah started overflowing at many places and caused damage to other houses too.
Locals had complained that the nullah had not been desilted for the last couple of years. There were also concerns by other residents of Ponda that the drain was choked with garbage and other waste material and that even bushes had started to grow there, which were all blocking the free flow of water. Further, mud from the on-going work of laying sewerage pipelines across Ponda had also found its way into the nullah. Farmers of Bandora and Kavlem had also complained about their farms being contaminated with the polluted water from the nullah and that they had suffered from skin infections too.
Locals had conveyed these demands to the Ponda MLA Ravi Naik, who had alerted the WRD and asked them to initiate the work urgently.
On Friday, WRD began the work in the presence of the Ponda MLA, Ponda municipal councillor Ritesh Naik, Curti Khandepar Sarpanch Shailesh Shet and Panch Dadi Naik.
In a separate development, the repaired footbridge at Mesthawada Curti was also inaugurated by the Ponda MLA. It was earlier in a dilapidated condition.
