Telangana: Nearly half of minor irrigation tanks empty by more than 50 pc

Farmers relying on the minor irrigation sources are fearing a trying time unless the deficit is compensated at least during the first half of August.

Hyderabad: The State has experienced below-average rainfall for a major part of the current month leaving nearly half the minor irrigation tanks with minimal inflows. Farmers relying on the minor irrigation sources are fearing a trying time unless the deficit is compensated at least during the first half of August. Widespread rainfall was experienced in the State towards the last week of July and it helped in making up for the deficit to a limited extent. But there was no significant improvement so far as the storage in the minor irrigation sources was concerned.

The tank filling status as on Tuesday (July 30) is quite worrying. The water storage is only zero to 25 percent in as many as 15,286 tanks of the 34,716 sources in 19 circles headed by Chief Engineers/Engineers-in-Chief of the Minor Irrigation Department.Whatever inflows they have at present were received after July 12. Farmers are still hopeful that the rainfall would improve further, bailing them out at least through crucial August to make up for the initial crop losses. Cotton crops were raised in a big way in the rain fed pockets and under the minor irrigation tanks in a big way.

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But dry spells resulting in poor germination of cotton seed had cast shadow on their hopes. The tank filling status is only 25 to 50 per cent in 6,499 Minor irrigation sources. It is 50 to 75 per cent in 3,464 tanks and 75 to 100 percent in 6,660 tanks. The number of minor irrigation tanks that were reported to have surplus inflows are only 2,807. Under the operational limits of the Engineer-in- Chief, Gajwel. over 4600 minor irrigation tanks received the least inflows. Similar conditions prevailed in Mahabubnagar and Nagarkurnool districts.Despite efforts to improve the situation, a majority of the tanks were not yielding to their full potential. The area irrigated by these tanks is significantly lower than expected.

The State has 46,531 minor irrigation sources with 2.62 lakh million cubic feet capacity. They were expected to extend irrigation support to 9.44 lakh hectares. The renovation of tanks under the Mission Kakatiya helped in improving their potential. But the scarcity conditions that prevailed over a large part of the state due to deficient rainfall impacted them and they failed to come to the rescue of the farmers.