2,850 tmc ft Of Godavari Water Flows Into Sea Untapped Every Year

Hyderabad: It’s a paradox. For generations, the Godavari river’s monsoon bounty in thousands of TMC has flown in full force into the Bay of Bengal, while the parched fields of Rayalaseema failed to get sufficient rain and never got enough of flows from the Krishna.

Andhra Pradesh now dreams of rewriting that story. The alliance government is keen on tapping the river’s surplus water to water-starved regions and carrying life into parched lands and freeing farmers from the grip of drought.

Official discharge figures from the Sir Arthur Cotton (SAC) barrage, the final control point on the Godavari before it meets the sea, reveal the scale of this criminal wastage. Between 2015 and 2024, the barrage released more than 28,500tmc of surplus water into the Bay of Bengal even after meeting the annual needs of a 10.4 lakh acre ayacut spread across the eastern, western and central Godavari deltas.

In this command area, about 240tmc is used each year for agriculture in the Kharif and Rabi seasons apart from the allocations for drinking water and industries. After meeting these needs, massive volumes -- enough to fill the Nagarjuna Sagar Reservoir over 90 times -- have flown past the gates unchecked in a decade.

The annual breakdown tells its own story. In 2015, 1,390tmc of water went into the sea. In 2016, it was 2,634tmc. The figure rose to 3,555tmc in 2019 and peaked at over 6,006tmc in 2022 – that’s enough to satisfy the water needs of the 10.4 lakh ayacut for 25 years.

Even in the driest year of the decade, 2017, the surplus was 854tmc. Over the decade, more than 90 per cent of the measured surplus at Dowleswaram was lost to the Bay, a clear indicator of the enormous untapped potential of the Godavari’s flood flows.

Against this backdrop, the Andhra Pradesh government’s ambitious Godavari—Banakacherla link project aims to harness 200tmc of surplus floodwater at a rate of 2.0tmc per day from upstream of the Polavaram dam on the Godavari river to the Banakacherla regulator on the Srisailam right main canal system.

This represents only a fraction of the river’s surplus, intended to drought-proof the water-deficit districts of the Rayalaseema region.

Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu stated, “To make Rayalaseema fertile, we would divert surplus Godavari water from Polavaram to Banakacherla. We would only use the water that would otherwise flow into the sea. This project will not harm the interests of any state.”

“When there are floods, and the upper riparian states release water, we, as a lower riparian state, bear the losses and hardships. If we, as a lower riparian state want to use that same floodwater, why should there be objections? How can it be that we must endure the floods but not benefit from the floodwaters,” Naidu asked.

Estimated at Rs 80,112 crore based on the 2024–25 schedule of rates, the project is planned in three segments — Godavari river to Krishna river (Rs 13,511 crore), Krishna river to Bollapalli reservoir (Rs 28,560 crore) and Bollapalli reservoir to Banakacherla regulator (Rs 38,041 crore).

The total length of the project is 400.4km, comprising over 379km of gravity canals, ten pumping lifts, nearly 38km of tunnels and 16.7km of pipelines.

Notably, some of these tunnels pass through forest land, which accounts for about 17,000 acres of the total; the approximately 47,999 acres of land acquisition required for the project. The proposed Bollapalli reservoir, a key component, includes 15,000 acres of forest land.

At the Nagarjuna Sagar–Srisailam Tiger Reserve, the state plans to use tunnel boring machine technology to minimise ecological disturbance, ensuring that the tunnel’s entry and exit points are located outside the tiger reserve boundary. The project would demand around 4,084 megawatts of power for its operation.

Once operational, the project would supply drinking water to around 80 lakh people, create 7.5 lakh acres of new ayacut and supplement irrigation to a further 22.5 lakh acres. In addition, about 20tmc of water is earmarked for industrial use, supporting the region’s economic growth alongside agricultural stability.

According to the project plan, the Godavari’s 400-km journey would start from the Tadipudi main canal, which is 80km long, and its 106-km extension running parallel to the existing 174km Polavaram right main canal in West Godavari district. From here, water would flow mostly by gravity through a 21km loop that includes a 10km tunnel and would be lifted once -- from FRL plus 45 metres to plus 67 metres -- to connect to the Krishna Basin through the Prakasam Barrage / Nagarjuna Sagar right main canal system near the Vijayawada region. The first segment would carry a discharge of 38,000 cusecs, flowing mostly by gravity after the initial lift.

The second segment would start from the Nagarjuna Sagar right main canal widening zone between the 0 and 80km mark in Guntur and Palnadu districts. The government is likely to build a barrage at Vaikuntapuram, from where a new canal would take water to Nekarikallu in Palnadu district and then to the NS right main canal. The flow would continue towards the proposed Bollapalle reservoir in Prakasam district. The reservoir will be at full reservoir level (FRL) plus 220metres above the sea level. It would have a storage capacity of 150tmc and require about 15,000 acres of forest land. In this segment, water would be lifted in six stages from around 17 metres on the Krishna side to 140 metres. It would pass through a 1.2km tunnel. The discharge capacity for this part would be 24,000 cusecs.

The third segment would move water from the Bollapalle reservoir through the longest tunnel in the project — a 26km underground stretch, designed to pass through 15,000 acres of dense Nallamala forest and hilly terrain. A major point of contention is the 19.5-km tunnel segment planned through the Nagarjuna Sagar–Srisailam tiger Reserve. Water would be lifted three times before the flow reaches the Banakacherla regulator near Owk in Nandyal district. From there, the water would be released into the Srisailam right branch canal, the Galeru Nagari Sujala Sravanthi (GNSS) network and the Telugu Ganga project along with subsidiaries such as the Kurnool Kadapa canal. This segment would also carry a discharge of 24,000 cusecs.

The water would help stabilise the ayacut across large swathes of Anantapur, Kurnool, Kadapa and Chittoor districts, which have long faced erratic rainfall and depleted groundwater tables. It would not only protect existing crop patterns but also enable farmers to grow an additional crop in years of abundant inflow.

A part of the diverted water would also be routed through branch channels to Prakasam and Nellore districts, where it would serve both the irrigation and drinking water needs.

The government hopes that integrating the project with existing canal infrastructure would allow for quicker and more cost-effective distribution without a need for entirely new large-scale canal networks.

Hydrological studies indicate that the Godavari maintains 90 to 120 days of surplus flows even after meeting all upstream and downstream riparian rights, which then rush unchecked into the Bay.

The project is designed to operate only during times of abundance. It would lie idle in the lean seasons to ensure Telangana’s allocations are unaffected and to remain within the Godavari water disputes tribunal award 1980 provisions.

The AP government has committed to this project as part of its ‘Swarnandhra-2047’ vision, aiming to provide drought-proof water security to its most backward districts with the support and cooperation of the central government.

However, Rayalaseema Saguneeti Sadhana Samiti president Bojja Dasaratharami Reddy said that “The Godavari–Banakacherla link project will not benefit Rayalaseema. Although the region’s projects have water, farmers are unable to make use of it due to the lack of sufficient field canals. Instead, the government should construct these canals and revamp and strengthen existing projects that can provide immediate relief to farmers. With an investment of ₹15,000 crore, around 7 to 8 lakh acres could be stabilised this very season. Why doesn’t the government prioritise this, rather than a project now estimated at ₹80,000 crore, which will inevitably escalate further, just as it did with the Kaleshwaram project in Telangana”

Data from the SAC Barrage underscores the enormous opportunity. Over the past decade, an average of more than 90 per cent of surplus water has flowed into the Bay of Bengal unused. Harnessing even a fraction of this through projects like the Polavaram–Banakacherla Link Project could drastically improve irrigation, drinking water availability, and industrial growth in the state. With environmental safeguards, interstate cooperation, and political pragmatism, this untapped water resource could end decades of water stress in drought-prone regions.