Flood affected victims of the towns of Lambagarh, Vinayak Chatti, Pandukeshwar, Govindghat and Pinoli Ghat in Uttarakhand have written to a slew of ministers demanding compensation for the damages incurred by the failure of the engineers of Jaiprakash Power Ventures Ltd (JPVL), to open the reservoir gates of the Vishnuprayag Hydro Electric Power Project (VHEPP).
This resulted in the unprecedented situation where the barrage could not withstand the pressure of the water and it burst.
These villagers allege in their letter to the minister of environment Jayanti Natarajan, minister of power Jyotiraditya Scindia, minister of water resources Harish Rawat and the Uttarakhand chief minister Vijay Bahuguna that dam waters had started rising from the evening of June 16. The letter claims that when the reservoir initially began to fill up, the JPVL officials opened the gates of the dam allowing the water levels to reduce. But the levels of water continued to rise forming a 2-km reservoir upstream. No attempt was made to empty the reservoir a second time and the dam burst.
“A wall of water carrying boulders and sediments destroyed the Lamagarh market place as also several homes and hotels and a vital PWD bridge linking Hemkund Sahib and the Valley of Flowers,” said Vimal Bhai, who runs an NGO.