Sardar Sarovar Dam completed after 56 years, Modi says, we did it

Utkal Reporter Bureau| 17 September 2017

Finally the Sardar Sarovar Dam project is complete after 56 years since it was initiated. Prime Minister Narendra Modi on 17 September dedicated it to the nation. The project will become the symbol of new power of India, said the PM.

H e called the Sardar Sarovar Dam an “Engineering Miracle.” And hailed all the efforts exercised against the challanges to see the project completed.

He said hardly there can be project in India that has faced as much obstacles as the Sardar Sarovar Dam project faced.” There was no force in the world which had not tried to stop the project.”

The project was made a subject for false propaganda; many conspired to stop the project, said Mr Modi and added that even the World Bank withdrew from the project citing environmental issues.

“But with World Bank or No World Bank we had determined to complete the project and we did it today.” said the PM.

He remembered that the saints and seers of Gujarat had played a very big role in the making of the Sardar Sarovar Dam

This project would determine the fate of farmers of Gujurat, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan; this project would determine the fate of the next generation in the 21^st century, said Mr.Modi.

Sardar Sarovar Dam is a multi purpose project on the river Narmada in Gujurat. The then Prime minister of India Jawahar Lal Neheru laid the foundation stone of the project in 1961 for the purpose of water, irrigation and hydroelectricity. But in course of time it was caught in controversies on its environmental aspect, its design and rehabilitation issues.

The project came across powerful protests and got engaged in legal fights since the second half of the 1980s. Medha Patkar’s Narmada Bachao Andolan NBA in 1989 and in the subsequent years has been a big movement agaist the project.