Hyderabad: Heavy rains in June, the first month of the Southwest Monsoon, in Telangana and AP have forced both the governments to rethink on construction of irrigation projects to store water instead of letting it go waste into the sea. The Krishna has several reservoirs like Almatti, Narayanapur (Karnataka), Jurala, Srisailam and Nagarjunasagar but they hit dead storage levels quickly. But at Prakasam barrage at Vijayawada, the terminal irrigation structure on the Krishna, officials are having to release 80 per cent of flood water into the sea. Farmers, who till last week were demanding water to raise seed beds, are now pleading with irrigation officials to stop the release waters into the canals as their fields are already inundated due to rain.
The reason is that the Munnair and Palair, tributaries of the Krishna, receive copious flows due to heavy rains in Khammam and Warangal of Telangana. Water from these two rivers reaches the Prakasam barrage directly as there are no reservoirs to store it. At other times, farmers in the Krishna Delta use the water to raise seed beds and after few days crave for water from Nagarjunasagar when the rains stop abruptly. Erstwhile governments thought that the Pulichintala dam, with 45 TMC ft storage capacity, could save the situation. In practice, the dam is heavily dependent on Nagarjunasagar for water.
Only the Halia rivulet and the Musi join the Krishna between the Nagarjunasagar and Pulichintala and these have no significance inflows Successive governments did not think of constructing barrage-cum-reservoirs between Pulichintala and Prakasam barrage to harness the dependable Munnair and Palair inflows into the Krishna. “It is time for the AP government to construct at least three barrage-cum-reservoirs below the Pulichintala so that we can minimise waste of precious water from Prakasam barrage.
The Pulichintala dam that was conceived to protect the Krishna delta is not of any help now. The only way is to build new projects to store water from Munnair and Palair,” former engineering-in-chief T. Hanumantha Rao told this newspaper. The AP government’s plan to built a river front capital does not mention about construction of additional barrages cum reservoirs ahead of the Pulichintala dam. Agreeing with this, AP irrigation minister Devineni Uma Maheswara Rao said that he would discuss the issue with CM N. Chandrababu Naidu.
Telangana redraws plan to use Godavari water
Rains across the five districts of North Telangana have filled up tanks and medium reservoirs, besides improving the ground water table, but the situation beyond Venkatapuram of Warangal district till the borders of Telangana in Khammam is different.
The Godavari overflows inundating several tribal tracts before reaching the Sir Arthur Cotton barrage near Rajahmundry and finally going waste into the sea. The Sriramsagar project, the only major irrigation dam across the Godavari in Telangana, reels at dead storage levels. The Lower Manair Dam near Karimnagar city is also short of water. The Polavaram Dam in AP and diversion of more waters to the Krishna delta and North Andhra would definitely help harness more Godavari flood waters.
Even after completion of all lift irrigation and gravitational schemes, a fair amount of Godavari waters would still go waste into the sea via AP. Deputy CM Kadiam Srihari, who has previously handled the major irrigation portfolio, said that the government is working to use an additional 150 TMC feet of Gowavari water by re-engineering of existing and ongoing schemes. “The present target is to serve Nizamabad and part of Karimnagar districts with the Sriramsagar project. Pranahita scheme and other projects would supply Adilabad,” he said.
