Alternative lands for Deduruoya displaced

Uditha Kumarasinghe

COLOMBO: The Government has taken measures to resettle villagers who will lose their lands with the construction of the Deduruoya reservoir. The Irrigation Ministry is now acquiring lands and making valuations on the properties that will go under water and resettling the displaced people, an Irrigation Ministry spokesman told the Daily News. The Cabinet has granted approval to a memorandum submitted by Irrigation Minister Anwer Ismail to acquire the State lands to resettle these displaced people.

Arrangements have been made to provide lands to 700 displaced families for farming under the Radawabendi Ela Irrigation Scheme in the Puttalam district and resettle another 210 families in State lands in the surrounding areas, he said. According to the spokesman, the estimated cost of the Deduruoya reservoir project is Rs.650 million. The project is scheduled to be completed by 2010.

A reservoir will be built damming Deduruoya thus saving a huge volume of water which is otherwise channelled to the sea without being used.

The Deduruoya project will irrigate 27,000 acres of paddy lands and provide drinking water to several areas in the North Western province. In addition, a 1.5 MW power station will be built under the project which will also assist the development of the inland fisheries industry, the spokesman said.