Farmers’ associations in Coimbatore and Tiruppur have expressed disappointment over the ‘silence’ of the government on second phase implementation of Athikadavu-Avinashi groundwater recharge project.

While speaking at the recent meeting in Udumalpet, Chief Minister M.K. Stalin did not get beyond stating that the first phase of the project was inaugurated during the DMK regime.

Farmers in the region have, for long, been asking for initiation of the second phase of the project.

The phase I project implemented at a cost of ₹1,916.41 crore has paved way for irrigation of 24,468 acres in Coimbatore, Tiruppur and Erode districts.

Pipelines were laid from the downstream of Kalingarayan Anicut to divert 1.5 tmc surplus water to 1,045 water bodies.

The petitions submitted subsequently by the farmers to the government for implementation of phase-II of the project have called for connecting an additional 1,400 water bodies in order to add 15,000 more acres under tank water irrigation.

The pipelines laid under Phase I to a length of 1,065 km across the three districts link 32 lakes of Water Resources Department, and 42 lakes and 971 ponds under Panchayat Unions.

In Coimbatore district, farmers in Karamadai block will be benefitted substantially when the phase-II of the project gets implemented.

There are still a chunk of water bodies linked by pipelines under Phase-I that do not get adequate supply.

According to the farmers, only 800 water bodies are getting the supply. The power supply is not up to the desired level in the six pumping stations.

Officials of Water Resource Department have received petitions from the farmers in the tail-end to rectify the breakages caused to the pipelines due to road-digging works carried out by TWAD, Highways and other government departments.

A senior official of WRD said blockages in the pipelines were being cleared.

On Thursday, farmers demanding second phase implementation held a meeting at Avinashi to decide on the next course of action.

“We were promised by the DMK Government that the second phase will be taken up immediately. But, even after passage of 4.5 years, there has been no progress,” ‘Athikadavu’ Sampath, who was in the forefront of sustained protests by farmers during 2016 for first-phase implementation of the project said.

“A similar protest will be carried out if there is no response from the government’s side for our demand for allocation of funds for second-phase of the project,” Mr. Sampath said.