Illegal sand lifting threatens dykes

Workers employed by an influential local take sand away from the embankment of the main canal of Teesta Irrigation Project at Kakra village in Nilphamari. The water in the canal can be seen below the X mark. Photo: Star

Mindless earth and sand lifting along the embankments built on both sides of the main canal under the Teesta Irrigation Project continue unabated, making the dykes vulnerable to collapse at anytime.   
If any of the embankments collapses, several thousand hectares of agricultural land in Dimla and Jaldhaka upazilas of Nilphamari would be inundated, locals said.  
While visiting the canal recently, this correspondent found several ditches were dug at various points along the embankments, especially beside the one known as left embankment.
The left dyke is important because the Bangladesh Water Development Board officials use the road constructed on it to monitor the irrigation project.     
Ditches around 5-10 feet deep and 100 feet long were spotted at no fewer than 20 points along the dyke in Paschim Balagram, Chaoradangi and Dundibari villages of Jaldhaka, and Kakra, Satjan, Khalisha Chapani and Dalia villages of Dimla.

At Dandibari village, part of the embankment has turned into a ditch close to the canal, marked X. Photo: Star

During the visit, the correspondent found that a sand lifter named Lebu along with some day labourers was lifting sand and earth at Kakra village.
Asked, he claimed they would use the sand to repair a local road.  
Villagers said some local people also extract sand and earth from the dyke to earth-fill their homesteads.
Originating from Teesta barrage point at Dalia of Dimla, the 18-km long and 278-foot wide canal stretches up to Dundidari of Jaldhaka, with 1400-1600 cubic feet water per second flowing through it.  
At least 20 different points on the embankments collapsed in the past since the inception of the irrigation project in 1998, hampering irrigation and inundating the adjoining villages, locals and the sources in the BWDB said.    
Mainuddin Mondol, BWDB sub-divisional engineer of Dalia division, said, “Local influential quarters assaulted the BWDB officials on several occasions in the past while they were conducting drives to stop the lifting.”   
“I myself became the subject of such attacks, and escaped with the help of police.”
BWDB Executive Engineer Mahbubur Rahman of the same division said he was facing difficulties to look after the vast irrigation project due to acute manpower crisis.
The practice of earth lifting cannot be stopped until the locals become aware of it, he said.  
He added that he had requested the union parishad chairmen to create awareness in this regard.