Dadupur Nalvi canal issue: Challenging HC order, Haryana govt to approach SC; Cong stages walkout

In response, the government initially said it had no knowledge of any such order. “No order has been issued by the Hon’ble Punjab and Haryana High Court regarding the construction of the Dadupur Nalvi canal”, Saini said, later clarifying that the court “had struck down only a provision of the law (notification)”.

Conceptualised in 1985, the canal was constructed during the Congress government’s regime in the state to recharge groundwater and provide canal irrigation in Yamunanagar, Kurukshetra, and Ambala districts. However in 2019, the BJP government decided to discontinue the project, opting to return 1,019 acres acquired for the scheme to landowners, while denotifying the acquisition process; compensation paid to farmers in lieu of the land acquisition was to be recovered. In 2024, the HC struck down the provision related to denotifying the acquired land.

Nirmal, highlighting the importance of the project, further said that a detailed discussion was required on the issue. It was introduced to recharge water table in the area, he said, adding that “the construction of the canal was almost completed”.
Led by former state CM Bhupinder Singh Hooda, the Congress MLAs expressed their displeasure and questioned why the government had come “unprepared”, and demanded clarity on whether they were willing to reconstruct the canal.

“You will construct the canal or not? Yes, or no?” Hooda questioned, asserting that with this, “the people would understand the intentions of the government”.

On this, Saini said the government would move the Supreme Court, challenging the HC order. “The Advocate General of Haryana has opined that the decision of the HC could be challenged by filing a special leave petition (SLP) before the SC. The preparation of the SLP is underway, and once reviewed by the advocate general, it is likely to be filed soon,” Saini said.

“This is a sensitive issue. A lot of politics has already taken place — the opposition is continuously politicising it,” he said, pointing out that the Act regarding the canal was passed during the Congress government’s tenure in the state. “The farmers had to face the consequences (because of the scheme).”

Not satisfied with the responses, the opposition Congress MLAs staged a walkout in protest against what they described as an “unsatisfactory reply” on the canal issue.

The course of action

Meanwhile, not allowing an immediate discussion on the canal issue during the Question Hour, Speaker Harvinder Kalyan said “if a notice is issued for a discussion over the canal issue, the same would be considered”. “The CM has already given a reply on this,” the Speaker added.

Following the walkout during the Budget session, parliamentary Affairs Minister Mahipal Dhanda said that the canal issue has already been addressed during different occasions — “whenever it was raised in the Assembly”.

Asserting that the BJP government had “liberated the people of Haryana from the exploitation”, Cabinet minister Krishan Kumar Bedi said that “a visit to the area concerned would be enough to understand the real picture — what people really want”.
Mentioning that the Dadupur Nalvi canal work had begun in 2004-05, Hooda had said in a recent statement: “For this, over 1,000 acres of land covering 50 kilometres was acquired. In 2008-09, water started flowing into the canal, and continued until 2017. This not only irrigated the farmers’ land, but also elevated the water table water… For the first time in the state’s history, the government closed the canal which had been running for nearly 10 years. The BJP government should learn lessons from the HC’s decision, and pay the outstanding compensation to the farmers at the earliest.”

In 2019, the former BJP-led state government had denotified the canal irrigation scheme, following objections by the comptroller and auditor general (CAG), deciding to return the 1,019 acres acquired to the landowners or their legal heirs. The CAG had pointed out that the “usefulness of the project was not convincing”. After obtaining legal opinion from the then advocate general, the canal issue was subsequently raised in the council of ministers’ meeting chaired by the then CM Manohar Lal Khattar. The land was denotified in July that year.