Balasore: Flowing through Rasulpur panchayat under Sadar block limits in this district, the Tulasi river, a distributary of the Jalaka river, has bifurcated the Rasulpur panchayat.
While many schools, colleges, hospitals, banks, ration distribution centres and the panchayat office are one side of the river, hundreds of acres of farmlands including three tribal villages are situated on the opposite side. More than 70 families inhabit this tribal village, bereft of essential services like heath and education.
Moreover, no MLA or MP has ever set foot in Gobindpur and Narani villages under ward No. 7 and Tulakadiha under ward No. 5 of Rasulpur gram panchyat. People residing along both sides of the river have been repeatedly writing to the Rural Development department, Irrigation department, District Collector and even to the Chief Minister demanding construction of a bridge across the Tulasi river, but to no avail. The residents of Oladi, Bada dhanadi and Sana dhanadi, including people from Nalabahara gram panchayat have been facing a number of inconveniences in farming.
The residents of this panchayat have to cover a distance of 17 kilometres through Nalabahara to reach the district headquarters. A bridge over the river would reduce the distance to only 5 kilometeres. If along with the bridge, a proper road is built from Oladi to Mirigimundi via Gobindpur, the distance to the National Highway (NH-60) will be only 3 kilometres. Although construction of half the length of this road has already been completed, nobody seems to care about completing the rest of the road, complained the villagers.
On the other hand, most villages under this panchayat get inundated during the rainy season. On top of that, tidal water in the river enters the farmlands directly breaching the embankment. Due to tidal ingress, hundreds of acres of farmlands are rendered unfit for cultivation for years. As a result of the efforts of the late MLA Madanmohan Dutta, Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY) was about to see the light of the day in this region, but a precious little has been done after his demise. After plaints were made before the serving MLA of this region, Swarup Kumar Das, upped his efforts to take necessary steps in this regard.
Naib sarpanch Shrikant Pani, ward member Sunita Majhi and many villagers, including Bhagaban Nayak, Makaranda Dalai, Laxmikant Soren, Satyananda Mohanty, Murali Soren, Manmath Soren, Harekrushna Dalai, Surjyakanta Marandi, Umakanta Soren, Kata Dalai and Banshidhar Dalai have demanded the construction of an all-weather bridge over the Tulasi river and a road connecting Oladi with the NH-60 via Gobindpur for the convenience of the residents of ten moujas along with Manudiha, Kushudiha, Oladi, Bada Dhanadi, Sana Dhanadi in the coming days.
In this regard, sarpanch Subhesh Kumar Nayak said, “Tulasi river has been the reason of people’s suffering in this region. Tidal water is breaching the embankments and entering the farmlands every year spoiling hundreds of acres of farmland. The irrigation department has been unsuccessful in giving a lasting solution to this problem despite numerable requests made to them.”
Balasore MLA Swarup Kumar Das said, “The Rural Development department has been intimated with the dire need of constructing a bridge here and process has begun to bring the road construction from Oladi to Mirigimundi via Gobindpur under PMGSY”.
