Hazaribagh, May 6: Deputy chief minister Hemant Soren said the government had taken the onus to clean up all reservoirs of accumulated silt while inaugurating the de-siltation work at Charwa dam this evening.

“The task has started with Charwa dam,” said the deputy chief minister.

He, however, sounded an alarm on the issue of the state’s land mafia, which according to him, was trying to grab ponds and dams.

Hemant said his government did not believe in holding inaugural functions sans work. “The de-siltation process started at Charwa last month. A huge quantity of silt has been dug out. In almost 60 years of the dam’s existence, it never got funds for de-siltation. But now, after this work, I assure you it will again be capable of supplying water for next 30 to 40 years,” he said.

He also said that in the wake of the water crisis, the government was planning to install hand pumps in every village panchayat.

But he had a word of ecological caution against deep boring. “It is true that poor rainfall in the last two years left no option for people but to go for deep boring, but it is a short-term solution. We must plant trees and harvest rainwater,” the deputy CM said.

Praising local legislator Saurabh Narayan Singh and Hazaribagh MP Yashwant Sinha, he said they had left no stone unturned to get the project cleared by the state government. On the demand to bring water from Konar dam, Hemant said last month, while on his way to Dumri (Giridih), his chopper crossed the dam and he thought of the project.

Singh, in his address, asked the government to release funds for other dams. DC Ravindra Kumar Agarwal said de-siltation work was the outcome of “combined effort of all”.

Later, Pani Panchayat members met Hemant on land grabbing at Charwa. They said the administration should demarcate the dam’s 375 acres. Principal secretary (drinking water and sanitation) Sudhir Tripathy said he would look into the matter.