Rajesh Vishwas, 32, a food inspector in Kanker district of Chhattisgarh state, dropped his $1,200 phone into the 3-meter-deep Kherkatta Reservoir on May 21 while on a picnic with friends. Vishwas said the phone contained sensitive government information and needed to be recovered.

After two days of divers failing to find the phone, Vishwas paid for a diesel pump to drain the lake, claiming he had asked permission from local water officials to release water into a nearby canal for farmers to irrigate.

The pump ran for three days, pumping two million litres of water from the lake, enough to irrigate 600 hectares of farmland. It was stopped after an irrigation department official came to inspect it following a complaint. Vishwas eventually found the phone, but it was not working.

Indian officials order lake to be drained to retrieve phones

"He has been suspended pending an investigation. Water is an essential resource and should not be wasted like this," Priyanka Shukla, a district official in Kanker, said on May 26.

Vishwas denied any misuse of his position, saying the lake water was only used for bathing by picnickers and not for irrigation or any other purpose. “The media has exaggerated the news,” he said.

The food inspector's actions were met with strong opposition from politicians. The BJP's national vice-president sarcastically said: "When people depend on tankers for water in the hot summer, this official has drained away two million litres of water that should have been used to irrigate 600 hectares of land."

Hong Hanh (According to BBC/Ground Report )