Congress govt must boycott GRMB meet or alter agenda: Harish Rao

Former Minister T Harish Rao urged the Telangana government to boycott the upcoming GRMB meeting, accusing Congress of failing to protect Telangana’s water rights and alleging a secret pact with Andhra Pradesh over the Banakacharla project.

Siddipet: Former Minister T Harish Rao demanded that the Government boycott the Godavari River Management Board (GRMB) meeting if it really had any commitment to protect the water rights of Telangana in the Godavari basin.

Speaking to news reporters after garlanding the statue of Prof Jayashankar to mark his birth anniversary in Siddipet on Thursday, Harish Rao said that the GRMB agenda for the meeting was to review the permissions accorded to Telangana projects on Godavari water, which the State must protest.

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Even though Andhra Pradesh objected to the Telangana proposed projects, he said that the BRS dealt with them properly and got permission for the project. If the government failed to boycott the meeting, Rao asked Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy to get the agenda of the meeting changed, sending a signal to Andhra Pradesh.

Stating that the BRS government under the leadership of Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao won rights of 380 TMCft water in the Godavari, he said that they proposed to utilise a total of 968 TMCft of water in which the BRS government brought permissions for 830 TMCft storage projects. He said that the proposals for the remaining 138 TMCft projects were also in the pipeline.

Questioning Congress’ inability to stop the Banakcharla project being built in Andhra Pradesh, the former minister said that Revanth was preparing to lose 48 TMCft of water rights meant for the Sammakka Sarakka project. Rao said that the Sammakka-Sarakka project will help to rejuvenate SRSP stage-2, spread in Warangal and Nalgonda districts.

He further accused Congress of having a secret pact with the AP government on Banakcharla. Stating that Prof Jayashankar put a lot of effort throughout his life to protect the rights of Telangana, Rao said that protecting the water rights of the State will be the best way to pay tributes to the departed soul.