Need Tankers, Not Water Train, Akhilesh Yadav Government Tells Centre

Lucknow: Bundelkhand is parched, but more than water, it needs water carriers, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav has told the Centre. A day after refusing a water train sent by the Centre, Mr Yadav's office today asked the Centre to send 10,000 water tankers to carry the water from borewells , which are sometimes located far from the villages.

The government has already deployed 400 water tankers in the area, but many more are required, officials said.

In a tweet today, the Chief Minister's office said:

UPCM @yadavakhilesh requests GOI for 10,000 road tankers to distribute water in Bundelkhand from available water resources around the region

- CM Office, GoUP (@CMOfficeUP) May 5, 2016

The Centre has sent a water train for Bundelkhand's Mahoba  - much like the measure it had recently taken for drought-hit Latur in Maharashtra. Around 40 villages are facing a crippling water in Mahoba, where half the hand-pumps have dried up due to the receding water levels.

But the train, which reached Jhansi yesterday, is still waiting at the station - hours after the state sent a letter to the Centre saying, "We have no Latur-like problem here... If we need water, then we will inform the railways."

The terse letter reflects a battle for credit in the state, where assembly polls will be held next year. Locals leaders of the ruling Samajwadi Party say the water train is a desperate attempt by the BJP to snatch credit from Akhilesh Yadav's government.

The BJP, which had won 71 of the state's 80 Parliamentary seats of the state in 2014, is hoping to make huge gains in the coming elections.  

Hence the state government's recent move to distribute relief material to Bundelkhand on a very large scale has rattled the local BJP lawmaker Pushpendra Singh Chandel, sources said. Sources close to Mr Chandel say it was he who had approached the railway ministry and asked for the water train.  

Amid the escalating water crisis, the Centre recently held a meeting with lawmakers of Bundelkhand.

"The focus of Centre's Bundelkhand strategy is going to be sharpened to deal with the water crisis and find a long term solution to the drought and poverty induced migration," Uma Bharti, the Water Resource and River Rejuvenation Minister, had told NDTV last month.