When I was a kid,my father and I used to visit a check dam on the river Godavari nearby our house.Come summer holidays we would definitely make a visit to that dam.Covering our faces with scarves and after a long ride on my dad's bike we used to reach the riverside.Crossing the whole check dam was a kind of achievement for me.Dad early on infected in me a sense of interest in adventure and history.In between our leisurely dips in the river my dad used to tell me about the history of dam.He told me the check dam was constructed by Sir Arthur Cotton.I was fascinated about Sir Arthur Cotton from then.We have all heard or read about the stories of the atrocities of the British Raj,But here was a man who honestly strived to improve the conditions of the villagers.So much so that Cotton was hated by his administrative superiors—thanks to his loving attitudes towards the people of India.Millions of people of the Krishna and Godavari delta still fondly call him Cotton dora.More about the man now.
He was a British general and irrigation engineer.He was born in the 1803 and entered the Madras Engineers in 1819.From 1828 he started his irrigation works in India starting from Tanjore.After his successful work in Tanjore he moved on to his next project which was to become one of his most important works.
In 1848 after a series of floods in the Godavari delta Cotton dora suggested that a plan to minimize the impact of the the floods and at the same time increase the productivity of the area.His plan was to build an anicut (The word anicut derives its origin from the tamil words anai cutta) across the Godavari river at Dowleshwaram near Rajamundary.At that time this area was one of the poorest in the Madras Presidency and Cotton dora firmly believed that creating irrigating cum navigating facilities would revive the area and turn into a rich area.He put forward his proposal in front of the East India Company and got their assent.
In 1852 the project was completed and the results of his work showed in the coming years.The region turned into one of the most prosperous in India and the people became well to do.After this work he moved on to the Krishna district where he built another anicut. This too had proved very beneficial for the people of the region.
Alexander John Arbuthnot in 1901 said-
''The effect of Cotton's works in preventing or in mitigating famines is unquestionable. In the great famine of 1877 four million persons are supposed to have perished in the more or less unprotected districts of the Madras presidency. In the districts protected by the great irrigation works, viz. Godávery, Krishna, and Tanjore, there were no deaths from famine, and it is estimated that the surplus food exported from these districts was sufficient to save the lives of three million persons''
He was knighted in 1861 for his services.He died on July 14, 1899 at Dorking, Surrey, at the age of 97.But people of Andhra Pradesh still remember him.Some of his ideas like the one about interlinking all the rivers of India are still being discussed today.Even today one can see the portraits or photographs of Sir Arthur Cotton in almost all government offices in the East and West Godavari districts.It is said that he is the only Englishman whose statue was installed in India after Independence.There are some 3000 statutes in all.
Once when we were on that check dam my dad asked a man crossing the dam that who had built this dam.Pat came the reply 'Cotton dora'.Thats something that would have made cotton dora more happy than his knighthood,The love of the people even after the passage of almost 150 years.
In 2009 a team from Andhra Pradesh went to London to find Cotton Dora's tomb and they found it in Dorking 50km from London.Here is the link for the full article.
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