People are not getting water from hundreds of tube wells in Meherpur district as the water level has gone down due to the ongoing heatwave. Thousands of families have been facing water shortage for last few days.
Moreover, enough water is not coming out through irrigation pumps in some areas of the region.
The residents of Meherpur and Chuadanga have experienced the highest temperature in the country since the beginning of the month.
Low water level causes a shortage of drinking and irrigation water in three upazilas of this district.
Meherpur is an agricultural district. The cultivation of 58 thousand 500 hectares of land in this district is dependent on irrigation. About 50,000 irrigation pumps are being used in agriculture.
Farmers said that it is difficult to cultivate due to water shortage in the irrigation system. One acre of land is usually irrigated in three hours. Now, six to seven hours are needed to irrigate one acre of land. The lands get dry very soon due to the excessive heat. According to the information of the District Public Health Directorate, there are 9 thousand 913 deep and shallow tube wells in the district. Among them, 2 thousand 239 are useless due to various reasons.
In several villages including Jaipur, Rajapur, Taranagar, Amdah, Bishwanathpur of Mujibnagar upazila in Meherpur, there is a shortage of water in tube wells and field irrigation pumps. Five out of every 10 tube wells in this upazila have become useless. The water needs of the family are being met from deep tube wells of various institutions including local mosques. A housewife of Jaipur village, Sabina Khatun, said that water has to be collected from different places in the village. Water is not available in the tube well installed in the house. Therefore, the needs of the family are being met by taking water from the village mosque.
Not only in Mujibnagar, such water shortage has also occurred in Amtoil, Manikdia and Jugirgofa villages of Gangni upazila.
Farid Al of Jugirgofa village of Gangni upazila said water is not available in the tube well of my house for a month. Little amount of water comes out by pressing a lot.
Bashir Uddin of Shahrabaria village said, I tried to install a tube well but water was not available after installing 300 feet of pipe. After giving 500 feet I got some water.
Kashem Sheikh, a farmer of Bhatpara village, said that my sallow machine could pump water for about one and a half hours with one liter of diesel. Now I am getting very little water. The time and cost gets almost doubled.
Environmentalist Enamul Azim said, due to geographical reasons, the number of rivers, canals and Beels in this region is less. All the reservoirs in the neighborhood have now been filled with soil. The changes that have taken place in the world have an impact on nature.
Meherpur Agriculture Extension Directorate Deputy Director Bijay Krishna Halder said, due to global weather, there is less water in the engine-run pumps in the fields. We recommend watering the fields between evening and night to avoid lack of irrigation water. Even if agricultural production is not a problem now, water scarcity could be a major threat in the future.
Meherpur public health official Imran Hossain said that this situation has arisen because the water layer has gone down. Then there is no rain either. This problem has arisen only for those who have installed tube wells on their own. There is no such problem with deep tube wells installed by the government. If someone installs a new tube well, he will have to install a deep tube well.