The closure of the last tunnel of the Tehri Dam leading to the slow submergence of old Tehri town has become a political issue, with Congress legislators from Tehri districts up in arms against their Chief Minister N D Tiwari over rehabilitation. With the Assembly elections drawing near, the ruling Congress government in Uttaranchal is in the dock as Kishore Upadhaya, Congress MLA from Tehri town, accusing the CM of being insensitive towards the plight of the affected people. ‘‘He has not visited Tehri even once to meet the displaced,’’ Upadhaya said. Two other Congress MLAs—Shoorveer Singh Sajwan of Rishikesh and Phool Singh Bist of Partapnagar—demanded that a special session of the Assembly be convened soon to discuss the problems of the affected people.Meanwhile, various Hindu groups in Haridwar, Varanasi and Allahabad are agitated over the closure of the Bhagirathi river. The stoppage of Bhagirathi, also known as holy Ganga river, has also agitated sadhus. Earlier, the sadhus had also decided to file a PIL in Supreme Court. The Bhagirathi river originates from Gangotri and joins the Alaknanda (which originates from Badrinath) at Devprayag town in Uttaranchal. From here, the two merged rivers flow as the Ganga in the plains. The flow of the Bhagirathi has been stopped these days by the Tehri Hydro Development Corporation (THDC) at Tehri to fill up the Tehri Dam reservoir.THDC officials claimed that they are committed to ‘‘ensure uninterrupted flow of Bhagirathi water as per the minimum requirement of 35 cusecs’’. V B Gupta, Additional General Manager (PR), THDC said that to ensure this flow downstream the dam site, they are acting on the recommendations of a panel formed in January 2001 headed by then Union Minister Murli Manohar Joshi. He also said that the issue of purity of Ganga water has been examined by National Environmental Engineering Research Institute, Nagpur. The old Tehri town which has been vacated long ago would be the first to be submerged in the rising Bhagirathi waters.
