Centre continues discrimination towards Telangana in restoration of water bodies

Centre has not released any funds for repair, renovation and restoration of water bodies in Telangana

Hyderabad: In the last four financial years, the Centre has not released any funds for repair, renovation and restoration of water bodies in Telangana, according to figures from 2018-19 that were placed in the Lok Sabha earlier this week.

Interestingly, Union Minister of State for Jal Shakti Bishweswar Tudu, even while providing this information in the house, appreciated Telangana for doing notable work in water conservation and harvesting under its flagship programme of Mission Kakatiya.

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As per the information placed in the Lok Sabha, a Central assistance of Rs.498.3 crore was released to 11 States between 2014-15 and 2022-23. Of these, Odisha and Telangana have completed the highest number of renovation works of 810 and 437 water bodies respectively.

However, the Centre sanctioned Rs 47.96 crore to Odisha while Telangana was sanctioned Rs 15.47 crore, over the last eight years.

No funds were released to Telangana since 2018-19 indicating sheer discrimination. However, the Centre released Rs 17.87 crore to Bihar where renovation works were taken up in only 59 water bodies and Rs.33 crore to Madhya Pradesh, which completed renovation works in 124 water bodies.

Not so surprisingly, the Jal Shakti Ministry has completed renovation of more water bodies in BJP-ruled States and other States ruled by friendly political parties under the Jal Shakti Abhiyan scheme, which was inspired by Telangana’s Mission Kakatiya.

Till December 6 during this financial year, the Jal Shakti Ministry completed renovation of 20,357 water bodies in Uttar Pradesh, 15,189 in Andhra Pradesh, 12,185 in Karnataka, 9,825 in Odisha, 9,014 in Tamil Nadu, and 7,849 in Chhattisgarh, among others. Only 3,414 water bodies were renovated in Telangana.

However, in response to a question, Bishweswar Tudu was all praises for Mission Kakatiya. He stated that several States had done notable work in the field of water conservation/harvesting such as ‘Mission Kakatiya’ in Telangana, ‘Mukhyamantri Jal Swavlamban Abhiyan’ in Rajasthan, ‘Jalyukt Shibar’ in Maharashtra, ‘Sujalam Sufalam Abhiyan’ in Gujarat, ‘Neeru Chettu’ in Andhra Pradesh, ‘Jal Jeevan Hariyali’ in Bihar, ‘Jal Hi Jeevan’ in Haryana, and ‘Kudimaramath’ scheme in Tamil Nadu etc. Incidentally, most of these schemes were inspired by Mission Kakatiya.