KURNOOL: Water gushed out of the Srisailam dam for the first time this season, further easing fears of water shortage following a couple of weeks of heavy rain.
AP water minister P. Anil Kumar lifted four radial crest gates of the dam, allowing 1 lakh cusecs of water to flow towards the Nagarjunasagar dam, which is all but empty.
Telangana state ministers Niranjan Reddy and Srinivas Goud joined Mr Anil Kumar in performing Jala Puja at the water release function.
Srisailam is receiving a 3.2 lakh cusecs of water from dams in Karnataka, which has been affected by severe flooding in the Krishna, via the Jurala project. The inflow is expected to increase further as the Jurala project upstream is releasing 4.91 lakh cusecs. The dam had water standing at 880.9 ft against the full reservoir level of 885 ft.
Elsewhere, the river Godavari has discharged 65 lakh cusecs of water from July 30, and the water level has fluctuated between 36.1 and to 47.9 feet at Bhadrachalam. This equates to 590 tmc ft of water going waste. This water would be sufficient to fill both the Nagarjunasagar and Srisailam dams. But all this water, except the 12 tmc ft storage at the Dowlaswaram barrage goes into the sea. On Fri-day, the river was flowing at 47.1 feet and discharging 11 lakh cusecs.
