PRLIS turns envy of its opponents

The progress of works on the drinking water component of the project has become the envy of parties that challenged the project in the courts of law and the Krishna Water Disputes Tribunal.

Hyderabad: With the Krishna Water Disputes Tribunal (KWDT-II) rejecting the interlocutory application filed by Andhra Pradesh seeking a stay on the utilization of 90 TMC from the 75 percent dependable flows into the Srisailam reservoir by Telangana, decks have been cleared for resuming works on the project.

The State is firm on taking up the works only with the concurrence of the agencies concerned. The irrigation component of the project is awaiting the environmental clearance from the Ministry of Environment. The Expert Appraisal Committee (EAC) has already given its recommendations with the State coming forward with readiness to fulfill all the conditionalities.

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The progress of works on the drinking water component of the project has become the envy of parties that challenged the project in the courts of law and the Krishna Water Disputes Tribunal. The tribunal has made it clear to Andhra Pradesh that it does not have the jurisdiction to entertain its application and that it was free to approach any other forum for relief as permissible under the law.

The first stage reservoir of the project at Narlapur, which was built with a gross storage capacity of 6.4 tmc, has received about 1.75 tmc of water so far. The reservoir cannot be filled in one go. It needs to be filled in a phased manner taking all precautionary measures, according to project Chief Engineer M A Hameed Khan.

“We want to fill it only up to two TMC for now,” he said.

The canal work connecting Stage I reservoir and the Stage II reservoir would be completed in a time bound manner. Water would be pumped into the Stage II reservoir very soon after completing the dry run and wet run of the high power pumping stations.