People do remember

If not all, atleast some people do remember the good work done.... An interesting news item appended below. Regards.

- Dilip.

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Source: The Hindu, 16-05-2006

Ritual honours for Father of Irrigation

Staff Reporter

Sir Arthur Cotton

Dulla (East Godavari): This tiny village on the banks of the mighty Godavari has paid homage to the Father of Irrigation Sir Arthur Cotton on his 203rd birth anniversary on Monday. This village along with hundreds of other villages has a tradition of celebrating Cotton's birth anniversary.

On Monday, hundreds of farmers woke up early in the morning and gathered about 500 litres of milk and handed it over to a big farmer Satti Bhaskar Reddy, who installed a bronze statue last year in front of his house. Mr. Reddy also invited Vedic scholars to the village and they performed puja to the 20-foot Cotton statue. The farmers of the village also presented clothes to the scholars.

After the puja, the villagers purified Cotton's statue with the milk they had gathered. All the villagers including women and children had sweets and snacks along with a cup of tea by way of celebration.

"Cotton, the unmatched and towering personality in the world of engineering had played a crucial role to provide assured irrigation to thousands of farmers who were haunted by famine and floods in Krishna-Godavari delta areas by constructing barrages across the two rivers. He gave us our bread and butter. So, it is the bounden duty of every farmer in this delta to pay homage on his birth anniversary," said Bhaskar Reddy.

An 80-year-old farmer K. Venkaiah expressed his anguish over the attitude of political leaders and engineers in Dowleshwaram, who failed to pay homage to the person who sacrificed his life for the welfare of farmers.