As per the standards, a crusher mill should be installed at least 500 meters from the river, 100 meters away from high-tension wires, and at least in 500 meters from roads, schools and human settlements. No crusher mill has met the aforementioned criteria in the district, according to the DSSI office.
“Every one of the 10 crusher mills has failed to meet the criteria,” said Hari Prasad Panday, head of the DSSI office in Dang. “We have been pressing them to comply with the criteria,” he added.
Panday also informed that most crusher mills in the district have been installed along the banks of the Rapti river in Deukhuri and other rivers along the Lamahi-Tulasipur road section.
Locals have time and again protested against such unscrupulous crusher mills for supposedly causing a decline in the water level in rivers due to rampant extraction of rocks.
The locals complained that they are facing problems with irrigation after the rivers became deeper due to the excavations. “The crusher mills are the main cause of the rivers becoming deeper so that river water cannot be channeled into the irrigation canals,” said Laxam Regmi, chairman of Manpure Irrigation Canal Users Committee. He also said that lack of irrigation is turning the agricultural land dry. Locals have been demanding removal of the crusher mills from the river banks.
“We have written to the crusher mills to ensure that they meet all the criteria for their operations,” informed Panday. “We have ordered them to meet the standards by the end of the last month of the current Nepali calendar year. After the deadline expires no crusher mill will be allowed to operate in breach of the criteria set for them,” he added.
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