Congress, BJP trade claims over credit for Dahi micro lift irrigation project ahead of inauguration

The Congress and the BJP have locked horns over who deserves credit for the Dahi micro lift irrigation project, even before it is inaugurated. Kukshi MLA and former minister Surendra Singh (Honey) Baghel has said the administrative sanction for the project was a decision of the Kamal Nath government. Cabinet minister Nagar Singh Chauhan, on the other hand, is presenting the inauguration and the irrigation facility that farmers will receive as an achievement of the government of Chief Minister Dr Mohan Yadav.

In a video message, Baghel said the project received administrative sanction on May 24, 2019. The Congress government led by Kamal Nath was in power in the state at the time, with Nath as chief minister. According to Baghel, he himself was the Narmada Valley Development minister then.

Baghel also said local public representatives had made efforts to get villages in the Alirajpur and Jobat areas included in the project. According to him, then chief minister Kamal Nath had given the project priority in the interest of farmers.

Chauhan, for his part, is putting forward the inauguration of the project and the benefits to farmers as the work of the government led by Dr Mohan Yadav. The BJP is describing as its own achievement the efforts to see the project through to inauguration and to provide irrigation to farmers.

The project is meant to provide irrigation to about 47,000 hectares of farmland in 126 villages of Alirajpur and Dhar districts. Farmers in the area have long been waiting for Narmada water.

On the journey from administrative sanction to inauguration, both parties are counting the contribution of their own tenures. The Congress links the sanction to the Kamal Nath government, while the BJP calls the inauguration and the facility for farmers an achievement of Dr Mohan Yadav's government.