23.58 ha of agricultural land affected by the overtopping of the Waregaon fly ash dam

Staff reporter:

Overflow of fly ash slurry from Waregaon ash dam of Khaperkheda Thermal Power Plant due to recent heavy rains damaged 23.58 ha of agricultural land. A joint team from the District Administration, MahaGenco and the Center for Sustainable Development (CFSD) conducted a panchanama in Waregaon village where 13 farmers were affected due to fly ash mud flooding in their land agricultural. Due to the rains, the ash dam in Waregaon overflowed and the ash mud mixed with the Kanhan River through a nullah. Sandeep Gaur, Kamalakar Bangre, Ratnakar Pagde, Prashant Sakharkar, NT Fulzale, Mayur Nanote and other officials were present during the panchanama.

The team inspected the village and the drain where the slurry flowed into the farmland. Farmers Shriram Gondale, Pundalik Gharat, Jivatu Devre, Vitthal Gharat, Ghanshyam Gharat, Nayanabai Farkase, Ramrao Jadhav, Narhari Jadhav, Krishna Jadhav, Shalu Deshmukh, Maroti Khadle, Hemraj Khadle, Shobha Vyas, Sanjay Gurav, Alka Gupta, Deorao Pande, Shankar Pande and Roshan Anaspure suffered losses when fly ash flooded their farms. District administration officials provided compensation to the farmers. MahaGenco’s negligence and failure to stop the overflow of fly ash slurry from the Waregaon ash dam caused damage to farmland. Sarpanch from Waregaon village had raised the issue at an environmental monitoring committee meeting recently. Initially, MahaGenco denied the Sarpanch’s allegations during the meeting. To assess crop losses in the farms around the ash dam, the panchanama was carried out. To avoid such incidents in the future, MahaGenco ensured to raise the ash dam at Waregaon. The power generation company is laying a new pipeline. The areas where the leak was the most important would be sealed in priority, he assured further.