News
President to hand over new Laggala town to residents
President Maithripala Sirisena will vest the new Laggala town with the public on Tuesday (8). The old Laggala town was submerged by the Kalu Ganga Reservoir due to the construction of the Moragahakanda-Kalu Ganga Multi-Purpose Development Project.
The old hospital
The new Laggala town was built to meet the needs of 3,000 families of the old town who were displaced due to the Moragahakanda-Kalu Ganga project. The new town has been designed according to the modern urban park concept with a total investment of Rs4.5 billion.
The town is another benefit of the Moragahakanda-Kalu Ganga Multi-purpose Development Project, which is the brainchild of President Sirisena. The Moragahakanda-Kalu Ganga project is the largest multi-purpose development project in the country.
The new Laggala town will encompass an area of 75 hectares and house 26 state institutions, including a police station, unit management office, cooperative building complex, Pradeshiya Sabha building, Divisional Secretariat, 3 senior schools, 2 junior schools, hospital complex, health centre, public playground, Wildlife Department office, public market and shopping complex, bus station and post office, as well as banks and financial institutions. A total of 112 buildings have been constructed at a total cost of Rs2,043 million. The town was designed with the aim of providing social and economic infrastructure facilities for residents. Its waste management and garbage disposal system was designed with the aid of the University of Peradeniya.
The new hospital complex
The new town is directly connected to Dambulla town by a main road, enabling government and private sector investment to flow to the area. In the past, it took 4 1/2 hours to travel from Matale to Laggala due to the poor state of the roads. Thanks to the road network constructed in conjunction with the new town, travel time between Matale and Laggala has been reduced to 1 1/2 hours.
Residents chose the spot on which to build their new town. When plans for the town’s construction were drawn up, attention was directed towards making maximum use of the area’s natural resources. Furthermore, the site was chosen after assessing that the environment was best suited for withstanding natural disasters.
It is also noteworthy that those who lost their lands due to the Moragahakanda-Kalu Ganga project were awarded the largest amount of compensation in the country’s history, with total compensation coming to over Rs11 billion. In addition to compensation, each family received a half-acre plot of land for housing and a 1 1/2-acre plot of farming land.
Residents have welcomed the construction of the new town, noting that it provides more facilities than the old town did. They also pointed out that prior to the project, they were only able to grow crops during one planting season a year. With the construction of the Kalu Ganga reservoir, they would be able to grow crops throughout the year. In the past, residents did not even have a government hospital to go to. Today, they even have facilities for electronic banking, residents pointed out.
Old school buildings
New school
A brand new post office
The new Divisional Secretariat building
The old Laggala town that was submerged