Wall built in Mahuva village to battle salinity ingress

Vijaysinh Parmar/TNN 29 August 2009,/DUGERI (Bhavnagar district): This is a story of sweet success. To fight salinity ingress and save their crops, villagers of the 5,000-strong coastal village of Dugeri in Mahuva taluka of Bhavnagar district have constructed a wall to prevent rainwater from flowing into the sea.
This has led to formation of a rainwater reservoir across 172 hectares which will enable farmers grow three crops a year. What's most striking is that though the work was done under the Central government's rural employment guarantee scheme, more than 200 workers were living above the poverty line. As a result of the wall, groundwater is being converted from saline to sweet. The soil wall, 300 metre in length, 20 ft in width and 6 feet in height, was built in two months. With this effort, the villagers are showing the way in water conservation and preventing environmental degradation. The sarpanch and her husband also joint the effort to encourage others to follow suit. Says sarpanch Manju Shiyal, "It was to give dignity to the work and highlight the importance of water conservation to improve agricultural productivity in the village." "Farmers in the village have not been able to get good yields due to salinity ingress. It is an old problem. Land is fertile and if sweet groundwater is available, farmers can harvest three crops a year. We used the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) effectively in this effort," says Bharat Shiyal, husband of the sarpanch. According to a gram panchayat official, this year 326 job cards were issued. "Of this, 200 cardholders are living above the poverty line and worked under NREGA just to make their farmlands fertile. This was the spirit in which villagers worked,'' he elaborates. Farmers expect this water conservation effort to benefit nearly 1,400 acres of agricultural land. "It will help recharge groundwater as soon as the whole reservoir fills with water. Currently, around 200 people need to migrate for employment. This will soon stop as sweet groundwater will trigger agricultural activity throughout the year,'' says farmer Mavji Bhaliya. Getting fresh groundwater is more important than economic returns from employment under NREGA, says villager Sukha Bambhania. Villagers plan to build more walls and do not want a single drop of fresh water to slip into the sea.