Telangana yet to hand over projects, KRMB in limbo
KRMB was supposed to take over all allotted projects across the Krishna from October 14
VIJAYAWADA: Though the Krishna River Management Board (KRMB) was supposed to take over all allotted projects across the Krishna from October 14, the whole process seems to have hit a roadblock as the Telangana government is not keen on handing over them to the board.
It may be remembered that the Centre issued a gazette notification on July 15 authorising the KRMB to administer, regulate, maintain and operate as many as 36 medium and major projects in the Krishna river basin located in Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Karnataka beginning from October 14.
The Andhra Pradesh government issued an order on October 14 handing over project components under Schedule-2 of the gazette notification along with offices, plants, machinery, equipment and diversion of staff to the KRMB.
As the Andhra Pradesh government wanted the Centre to allow the KRMB to take control of all projects mentioned in Schedule-1 and some projects mentioned in Schedule-2 and sought exemption for those mentioned in Schedule-3, it expressed its willingness to hand over project components to the board in its GO.
However, the gazette notification mentioned that both the AP and the Telangana governments should hand over projects at the same time to the KRMB, but the Telangana government has not yet issued any GO to hand over the projects falling under its jurisdiction. Due to this, the KRMB is unable to proceed to take control of the projects in both the states.
Moreover, both Andhra Pradesh and Telangana are supposed to pay seed money of Rs 200 crore each to the KRMB to carry out its regular work and such money is yet to be paid by both the states.
The water resources authorities say that the KRMB has informed the Centre about how AP government has issued an order handing over the projects to it as per schedule while its Telangana counterpart has failed to do so resulting in its inability to start functioning. The sources also say that the KRMB has also sought the intervention of the Centre on the issue to resolve it amicably.
Meanwhile, AP is not happy with Telangana as it has been generating hydel power mainly from Srisailam and Nagarjuna Sagar projects by releasing huge amounts of water against the norms and causing such water to go waste into the sea. AP’s request to Telangana to stop hydel power generation when water level in reservoirs of Srisailam and Nagarjuna Sagar was alarming, also failed to yield any positive result.
AP water resources engineer-in-chief C. Narayana Reddy said, “Our government issued an order handing over all requisite components of the projects located in its jurisdiction to the KRMB on the scheduled day itself but as Telangana government is non-cooperative to hand over its projects, the KRMB is yet to start its functioning from October14, as the norm says both the states should hand over their projects simultaneously.”