Kharasrota Water Project: Odisha Govt In Dock As IIT-HYD Denies Conducting Environment Impact Study

Kendrapada/ Bhubaneswar: The Odisha government citing IIT-Hyderabad studies to justify Rs 754-crore mega drinking water project over Kharasrota river in Kendrapada district has come under the lens after the educational institution denied having submitted any report in this regard.

Notwithstanding vehement protests, the government has gone ahead with the construction work. While the Kendrapada administration had argued in favour of the project, Executive Engineer of the District Rural Drinking Water Supply & Sanitation (RWSS) B Nayak, in a press release through the I&PR Department on August 14, said going by reports by experts of IIT-Hyderabad and the Odisha University of Agriculture Technology (OUAT), the proposed project will utilise only 5 per cent of the water of Kharasrota. Besides, he had maintained the proposed project will have no adverse impact on the biodiversity of Bhitarkanika.

However, Deputy Registrar of the institute Syed Ali Sabeer clarified that no report of environmental and social impact assessment of the project has been submitted by it to the Odisha government. Neither the state government has written to the IIT-Hyderabad about the proposed project nor an expert team of the institute has visited the project site, he added.

The clarification was in response to social activist Pratap Chandra Mohanty’s application seeking details about the purported study from IIT-Hyderbad under the Rights to Information Act, on August 30.