Sanjay Tidke is a 42 year old farmer from Maharashtra’s Akola district. This man has claimed to see how the government officials in his area changed colours regarding a matter he is involved in. The village, in which Tidke resides needed a strong dam construction to protect the farm fields of the all the people concerned with agriculture.
Now Tidke knew any such construction would require government’s permission and subsequent monetary efforts. But after being rejected and his poor plea being neglected, he decided to build it himself. He sold 10 acres of his land for 55 lakh in order to get at least 20 lakh to construct a concrete dam for his fellow farmers.
Tidke told the media that, “I have 20 to 25 acres of land, a canal flows through my farm and since there was no dam to block water, every monsoon a large portion of my farm would get washed off. I used to make a dam with soil, but after the rains the soil dam used to sink. I did this for two years in 2013 and 2014, but eventually I decided to build a concrete dam. It was too expensive, so I went to seek the help of the administration.”
Since our generous dam constructor knew the knows and hows of dam functioning he took his sell out money and started building one. But he reported that the “government officials raised objections when he began to build the dam and filed complaint against him for using the soil as they dubbed it ‘illegal’.”
He added in his report that, “The administration tried to harass me in the name of law. The construction of dam was stopped for four to five days. I faced a loss of Rs. Two lakh. I informed them about my problems, I repeatedly asked the government for assistance to build a dam, but they refused to provide any assistance. So, I decided to build the dam on my own.”
We talked about governments changed colours initially, because till now you’ve seen how steps against Tidke were taken by them to make him stop and referred to his soil for dam as ‘illegal’. But with time when Tidke received great praises for his attempt to save the livelihood of his village farmers, the government took an opposite turn and is now all in support for the man.
Tidke clearly said to the reporters that, “They are the ones, who didn’t help me when I was pleading them for support. Now, they are saying that they would assist me in the rest of the work.”
