Punjab Water Resources Minister Barinder Kumar Goyal has directed officials of the Drainage Department to expedite the work of removing accumulated silt beneath the Gidderpindi railway bridge. He issued these instructions while chairing a meeting with senior Drainage Department officials at Nirmal Kutiya after attending the ongoing sports festival in village Seechewal.
The minister also instructed officials to increase the number of tipper trucks engaged in the desilting work in the coming days. Rajya Sabha Member Balbir Singh Seechewal brought to the minister’s attention that the embankment near village Mandala Chhanna on the Jalandhar side of the Sutlej river has been strengthened with stone pitching worth Rs 16 crore.
However, he cautioned that unless the river flow is diverted towards the center through the creek channel and the accumulated silt beneath the railway bridge is removed, even the Rs 16 crore protection work may not be sufficient to withstand potential floodwaters.
Seechewal further informed the minister that the pace of desilting work beneath the railway bridge is extremely slow. If the work continues at the current rate, it will be difficult to clear a proper passage for water flow beneath the bridge before the monsoon season.
He recalled that in 2023, senior department officials had believed that Punjab’s flood season historically occurred in August or September. However, that year’s floods defied all previous patterns when severe flooding struck during the night of July 10-11, causing widespread devastation across the region.
Notably, around 40 tipper trucks are currently engaged in removing silt from beneath the Gidderpindi railway bridge. The available time for completing the work extends only until June 30.
The bridge consists of 21 spans, with 15 to 18 feet of silt accumulated beneath many of them. Even half of these spans have not yet been fully cleared. Seechewal emphasised that unless the pace of desilting is increased immediately, water drainage beneath the bridge could become severely restricted before the onset of the rainy season, exposing the surrounding region to the risk of flooding.
