Mangaluru: Nethravathi Rakshana Samyukta Vedike held a massive protest rally from Jyoti circle to DC’s office on Monday at 3.30 pm with the aim to pressurise the government to drop the Yettinahole project.

Leaders across political spectrum and religious leaders of all the faiths led the rally from the front.

Addressing the gathering President of Nethravathi Rakshana Samyukta Vedike Vijay Kumar Shetty said that in 2001 the project started in the name of ‘Nethravathi Nadi Tiruvu Yojane’ when people opposed the project the name was changed to ‘flood diversion project’.

When people did not agreed with this project also finally for the third time the name was changed to ‘yettinahole project’. The government may have thought that by changing the name of the project they can fool the people of Dakshina Kannada.

“This is not possible,” he said.

“In this protest all the leaders from different religion have taken part. All the 60 Corporators and 35 Zilla Panchayat Members are also with us,” he said.

Vedike Member M G Hegde said that, it is possible to build another Vidhan Soudha, but impossible to create another Western Ghats and Netravati river. “When you cannot pump water from Thumbe to mangaluru city efficiently, how would you pump water from Yettinahole to Kolar,” he questioned.

Mangaluru South MLA J R Lobo said that, all the governments since the commencement of project are responsible for this mess up.

“Do you know how this project affects the biodiversity of Western Ghats? Do you know how this project affects the water resources of DK? If you have answer for these questions, then please educate the people about it,” he added.

MP Nalin Kumar Kateel said that, it is important to protect ‘Tulunadu’ and Netravati as one and the same.

“We do not want to add fuel to the burning problem, but if our quota of water is denied we cannot be held responsible if the situation goes out of control. Till now we were staging peaceful protests, but the government has forced us to intensify our protest as it is not responding to our demands,” he said.

Saandipani Mutt Swami Eesha Vittala Swamy, Odiyoor Gurudevananda Swamy, Fr J B Crasta, Fr William Menezes, Ibrahim Al Tanhal, Mohammad masood, Satyajith Surathkal and others were present.