Hubballi: The members of Janata Dal-United (JDU) district unit have demanded the rejuvenation of Water and Land Development Institute (WALMI) located in Dharwad and development of better infrastructure there.
Submitting a memorandum to the government through the Tahsildar in Hubballi, the JDU members lamented that the training programmes at WALMI were not reaching large number of farmers.
WALMI was established in Dharwad in 1985 with an objective to conserve and efficiently manage water, land and soil for the farming community. By doing so, there could be economic growth, and it would also promote environmental quality.
However, the WALMI which began its activities three decades ago, has now derailed and no farmer is getting information on the works taken up by this institute. The WALMI is not conducting any study regarding the irrigational schemes or on conserving the agricultural lands from getting degraded, they said.
According to official sources, WALMI should have conducted hundreds of training programmes and workshops besides field demonstration every year but unfortunately not a single programme is being conducted, they charged adding that the in-house magazine brought out by the WALMI too had been stopped since recently.
The government should rejuvenate this institute of national importance and strengthen it on par with WALMI run in Maharashtra which is very active, they said.