Kottayam: Store owner donates land for drinking water tank

KOTTAYAM: Scaria John, 52, a provision store owner, donated three-and-a-half cents of land to the Kerala Water Authority (KWA) at Thuruthy, a few km from here beside the MC Road to construct a drinking water tank. Mr Scaria, who is from a middle class family, was earlier driving an autorickshaw for 20 years in the Changanassery market. He donated the land worth approximately Rs 20 lakh when KWA authorities intimated locals that the fund for the project estimated at Rs 3.65 crore may lapse if the land for construction was not made available. The KWA water tank project cost did not include the cost of land as the CSI Church at Thuruthy had promised land for free for the project. However, when the fund was approved, there were differences in the Church committee on giving land for the project.

At that time Mr Scaria John came forward and offered to gift the land to save the project. People living in the region have been facing an acute shortage of drinking water for some time. Mr Scaria, who was known as Salichan among the locals, told this newspaper that he is not a wealthy man to donate the land which could have fetched him some decent money, but did it as a social service. The land is situated behind his provision shop and a few people had offered to buy the land earlier. “I donated the land since KWA authorities said that we may lose the drinking water project if no proper land was identified. The fund may lapse resulting in the project getting delayed for many years. Since the water shortage is grave, I donated the land for construction of the water tank," Mr Scaria told this newspaper.

The water tank which has the capacity to pump more than 10 lakh litres of water per day, will benefit around 20,000 people of the ward numbers 1,2,3, and 4 of the Vazhapally panchayat and two wards of the Kurichy panchayat. An independent pipeline from Cherukarakunnu water tank at Changanassery will supply water for the proposed water tank. It is sourced from the Kattodu project at Thiruvalla drawing water from Manimala river which gets purified at the 33 MLD water treatment plant at Thiruvalla. The Good Samaritan from Thuruthy has a wife and two children.