Telangana on path to recovery from monsoon setback

The worst seems to be over for the farming community in Telangana, which was on its toes with the monsoon playing truant in June

Hyderabad: The State is well on the path for recovery from the initial rain-related setbacks that had cast a shadow on the Kharif prospects. The worst seems to be over for the farming community, which was on its toes with the monsoon playing truant in June.

A majority of the Godavari basin projects are brimming and are holding hope for part of the ayacut of the Krishna basin projects as well. Part of the Nagarjuna Sagar project ayacut can draw its supplies from the Sriram Sagar Project Stage II, which has been equipped well to bail out major pockets in Nalgonda, Suryapet and Khammam districts. They were otherwise fed by the Nagarjuna Sagar Left canal.

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The SRSP has been receiving inflows in the range of 1.75 lakh cusecs and it is expected to continue the same way for not less than a week for impounding it to the gross capacity level of 90 TMC.

The State has started drawing water from the Nagarjuna Sagar project to meet its drinking water needs. About 625 cusecs were released from the project to support drinking water supply to Hyderabad and Secunderabad. The Irrigation department is planning to give 1.5 TMC to the Palair balancing reservoir and other projects en route. The State has placed its water indent with the Krishna River Management Board seeking some 10 TMC of water.

The government wanted to give priority to Mission Bhagiratha till the end of September. But the Krishna River Management Board (KRMB) has issued release orders permitting it to draw up to 8.5 TMC from July to September.

The availability in the project is only 12.73 TMC. Andhra Pradesh was also permitted to draw 5 TMC from the dam. The live storage capacity of the project is only 144 TMC as against the gross storage capacity of 312 TMC.

The Srisailam project in the basin has received no significant inflows. However, raising the hope of farmers under the Krishna basin projects, the Jurala project started receiving some 25,000 cusecs as inflows.

In case of further delay in receiving inflows into the Krishna basin project, Irrigation authorities are confident of supporting part of the 6.3 lakh acres ayacut of the NSP left canal in Telangana from the SRSP.

The SRSP Stage II is intended to give water to over 4.40 lakh acres in Warangal, Khammam and Nalgonda district. The Sriram Sagar is expected to reach the FRL with gross storage of 90 TMC within a week. The project had an addition of nearly 35 TMC to its live storage capacity in less than a week.