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PLACES
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NAWEGAON BANDH
Navegaon, popularly known as Navegaonbandh, is a village of 4.771 inhabitants in 1971 in Sakoli tahsil situated about 18 miles east of Sakoli. It has a railway station at Deulganv on the Gondia-Brahmapuri narrow-guage railway and is about 40 miles by rail from Gondia. The well-known and the largest tank, Navegaon tank, is situated in this village. "The tank has a circumference of about 17 miles and a water surface of about five square miles.
The average depth is said to be 40 feet, increasing in places to 90 feet. Water is taken from the tank through sluices in irrigation channels and is distributed to five villages. The area irrigated is said to be about 2,500 acres. The tank is surrounded by hills showing eight distinct peaks, and numerous streams pour their waters into this rocky basin, which is closed by two embankments 110 and 748 yards in length, respectively. The shape of the tank is very irregular, running into long creeks behind the hills,
but the short lengths of the embankment show how well the site was selected [Bhandara District Gazetteer, 1908 ed., pp. 214-21 ]". Rebuilding and expansion of the tank was taken, up in the First Five Year Plan and was completed at a considerable cost. A net-work of canals was built to feed the hungry land with water. The tank has now a capacity to irrigate about 13,500 acres of land. Originally this tank is said to have been built by Kolu Patel Kohali in the beginning of the eighteenth century at a cost of Rs. 64,000. Kolu Patel has apparently been deified as Kolasur Dev and his shrine stands on one of the peak's surrounding the tank. The other peaks are known as
Sat Bahini or the Seven Sisters and it is believed that these deities assisted Kolu in building the tank, by coming and working on the embankment at night when the labourers had retired. Some whitish-yellow stones on Kolasur hill are pointed out as the baskets of the Seven Sisters in which they carried earth, and the smaller length of the bank which sustains the greatest pressure of water is said to
be their work originally. On the bank of the tank is a statue of Hanuman, the deity of strength, whose feet are believed to go underground into the embankment. An island in the centre is known as Maldongri and it is related that in times of Pendhari raids the people of the village sought refuge in the island with their property, and all the available boats so that the Pendharis could not reach them. Crowning the top of one of the hills and overlooking the lake is one of the finest rest houses in the State unfolding before one's eyes a bewitching view of the lake below, and the forest-clothed hill sides. For its pastoral beauty the spot is unrivalled in the district and if developed could become a good health resort. A stone pillar standing in the village is called Balaji column with figures of deities carved on it. Navegaon has a primary health centre, a sub-post office, educational facilities upto the high school level, irrigation sub-division office, a branch of the District Central Co-operative Bank and a forest depot. A weekly market is held on Thursdays.
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