Rajghat, the Mahatma Gandhi memorial, and adjoining inhabited areas in Madhya Pradesh’s Barwani, have submerged under Narmada waters that have been gradually rising since the closure of gates of the Sardar Sarovar Dam in neighboring Gujarat in June.
The water level rose from 123.6 metres on August 30 to 128.5 metres on Friday-- much above the danger mark of 123.2 metres-- inundating the Samadhi site, farms and inhabited areas closer to the Narmada banks.
Noted Gandhian Kashinath Trivedi brought ashes of the father of the nation, his wife Kasturba Gandhi, and his secretary Mahadev Desai to set up the memorial on the banks of Narmada in 1965. The place came to be known as Rajghat.
The government, however, dismantled the concrete structure of the memorial and shifted the urns containing the ashes on July 27, few hours before Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA) leader Medha Patkar was scheduled to start her hunger strike at Rajghat.
The government will build the memorial to another safer site in the district.
District officials, police and the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) are on high alert in the two affected districts of Barwani and Dhar, keeping a tab on the developments and making appeals to project-affected people to vacate their homes in time.
Vice-chairman Narmada Valley Development Authority Rajneesh Vaish said: “The Narmada Control Authority’s requirement is to have a water level of 130m. So water will further rise in the next few days.”
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