Telangana government procures machines from Belgium to count fish
There were complaints that contractors had fudged the number of fingerlings last year but claimed full bills, causing loss to state exchequer.
Hyderabad: The state government has procured machinery from Belgium to count and record the exact number of fingerlings that are to be released into water bodies from August 30.
Last year, the government had released 27 crore fingerlings and the target had been increased to 70 crore this year.
There were complaints that contractors had fudged the number of fingerlings last year but claimed full bills, causing loss to state exchequer. The equipment has been purchased to avoid similar allegations. The government has also ordered videography of release of fingerlings to ensure transparency.
Explaining why the machinery had been purchased, fisheries mi-nister Talasani Srinivas Yadav said, “It is not possible to manually calculate such a large number of fingerlings.”
He said the project will be launched this year at Singur. The 70 crore fingerlings, worth Rs 52 crore, will be released in 77 reservoirs, 4,647 government tanks and 20,391 gram panchayat tanks, he said.
