Khammam Irrigation Tanks to Get Godavari Water Within a Year: Tummala
Once the Sitarama LIS is completed, Khammam district will receive adequate Godavari water for irrigation, Tummala said.
Nalgonda: Agriculture minister Tummala Nageswara Rao on Tuesday said irrigation tanks in the erstwhile Khammam district would be filled with Godavari water within a year after the completion of the Sitarama Lift Irrigation Scheme (LIS).
He was speaking after launching the Manchukonda Lift Irrigation Scheme on the Nagarjuna Sagar Left Canal at Venkatayapalem in Raghunadhapalem mandal. He said the project had been completed within a year of the foundation stone being laid, as promised.
The minister said most farmers in the mandal were tribal, small and marginal farmers and that the Manchukonda LIS had fulfilled their long-standing demand for irrigation. He added that about 300 lift irrigation schemes had been established in the erstwhile Khammam district and that Manchukonda was the last such scheme on the Nagarjuna Sagar Left Canal.
Once the Sitarama LIS is completed, Khammam district will receive adequate Godavari water for irrigation, he said. He added that irrigation tanks in Raghunadhapalem mandal would also be filled through gravity flow once the Buggavagu project was completed, providing farmers access to Krishna, Godavari and Bugga stream waters.
The Manchukonda LIS, taken up at a cost of Rs.66 crore, will stabilise 2,400 acres of ayacut under the Nagarjuna Sagar Left Canal by filling 33 irrigation tanks.
The Minister said the State government was developing godowns and other infrastructure for the agriculture sector and aimed to make Telangana a leading State in oil palm cultivation within three years. He urged farmers to take up oil palm cultivation, noting that India imports palm oil worth about Rs.1 lakh crore annually.
He also said there was no shortage of urea fertiliser and that there were no problems with crop procurement, power supply or irrigation.
Khammam police commissioner Sunil Dutt, additional collector Dr P. Srija and Telangana state warehousing corporation chairman Rayala Nageswara Rao were present.
