HYDERABAD: The Telangana government urged the Krishna River Management Board (KRMB) to restrain the Andhra Pradesh government from taking up Chitravathi pumped storage hydel power scheme and other schemes which are linked with GNSS (Galeru Nagari Sujala Sravanthi) and HNSS (Handri Niva Sujala Sravanthi) projects, which draw water from Srisailam without appraisal by the KRMB and approval of Apex Council as per the AP Reorganisation Act, 2014.
It also requested the KRMB to inform the Centre to omit the project components of Nagarjunasagar left canal mentioned in the gazette notification from Schedule-2 till the final KWDT-2 Award. It also requested the board to restrict water utilisation up to Kattaleru river as per Joint Project Report 1954 and those areas shall be irrigated through alternate sources such as Chintalapudi LIS etc.
Telangana irrigation engineer-in-chief C. Muralidhar has written two letters to KRMB in this regard on Tuesday.
"Telangana has requested the KRMB to restrain AP from going ahead with Pinnapuram pumped storage hydel power project which is based on Krishna water in December 2020 and September 2021. So far, there is no response received. However, to the utter dismay of Telangana, it is learnt that the work is still going on. Further, it is learnt, there are four more pumped storage hydel projects, namely Gandikota (Kadapa), Chitravathi (Anantapur), Somasila (Nellore) and Owk (Kurnool) in Penna basin taken up by AP," he said.
Stating that all the pumped storage schemes proposed by AP were linked with water diverted from the Krishna, he said, "From a deficit basin (Krishna), diverting water to outside basin and utilising for hydro power generation is highly objectionable while the in-basin areas are starving for water. Further KWDT-1 & 2 have observed that the water diverted to other basin return flows is totally loss to the basin."
In another letter, the TS government brought to the KRMB's notice about the expansion of the Nagarjunasagar left canal neglecting the DPRs of Nandikonda project submitted by the governments of undivided Andhra Pradesh. He said the ayacut of left canal of the Nagarjunasagar project was up to the Katleru stream in Nandikonda according to the project
report.
He also reminded that the ayacut presented in the erstwhile Madras state was only 1.3 lakh acres and the ayacut was extended after 1956 against the project report. "The ayacut in Andhra has been extended to 3.78 acres reducing 60,000 acres of ayacut in Telangana. While lakhs of acres have to be brought under cultivation by lift, AP neglected the issue. It also neglected stabilising 53,000 acres as small ponds. Telangana lost the ayacut when AP lowered the minimum water level by 13 metres," he said.
"There is no agreement between AP and Telangana on the Nagarjunasagar project. According to the project report made before the Brijesh Kumar Tribunal in 1954, the project ayacut in Andhra should be up to Katleru stream limiting it to 1.3 lakh acres," he added.
