Telangana ready for 50:50 sharing of Krishna water with AP

C Muralidhar Rao, Engineer-in-Chief (General), Irrigation and Command Area Development wrote to the chairman of KRMB, bringing to his notice various concerns of the Telangana government.

Hyderabad: The Telangana government on Thursday said the State was agreeable to sharing Krishna water with Andhra Pradesh in the ratio of 50:50 from the 2021-22 water year till the Krishna Water Dispute Tribunal-II gives its decision, since the State was in distress due to insufficient water even after seven years of its formation.

C Muralidhar Rao, Engineer-in-Chief (General), Irrigation and Command Area Development, in a letter to the chairman of Krishna River Management Board, brought to his notice various concerns of the Telangana government. He pointed out that the Krishna Water Dispute Tribunal-I (KWDT-I) considered Srisailam as a hydroelectric project and held that the minimum annual release from the project would be to meet the requirements of Nagarjuna Sagar Project and Krishna delta canals.

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In view of meeting the requirements of Krishna delta from the water diverted from Godavari River, the flows required from Srisailam reservoir to meet the requirement of NSP was 265 TMC after excluding self-generation of 15 TMC between Srisailam and NSP from out of total requirement of 280 TMC.

It is pertinent to mention that the KWDT-I made an en bloc allocation of 811 TMC out of 75 per cent dependable flows to erstwhile AP apart from liberty to use remaining water. Unequivocally, a five judge bench of the Supreme Court clarified that the allocations made by KWDT-I was en bloc and not project-specific allocations.

The KWDT-II is making project-wise specific allocation to AP and Telangana as per Section 89 of APRA-2014. In view of the same, an adhoc arrangement in June 2016 was made to use Krishna water in 512:299 for one year only without any prejudice to claims of States before any fora.

This was modified to 66:34 (AP:TS) in 2017, excluding minor irrigation utilisations, evaporation losses and Pattiseema diversions for one year.

Muralidhar said KWDT-I did not allocate water to any project diverting Krishna water to outside basin from Srisailam. However, the erstwhile AP, on the pretext of supplying 15 TMC to Chennai City drinking water supply scheme, taken up several schemes to divert Krishna water to outside basin without any regard to in-basin needs.

In view of the same, AP is not authorized or allocated any water from Krishna waters to outside basin.

According to Muralidhar, the report of National Commission for Integrated Water Resources Development Plan (NCIWRD) Vol-I1999 states that “in approaching this complex issue, begin with assessment that it will not be possible to persuade a State to spare water till its own demands are met to the maximum possible extent”… and “After meeting all these essential requirements, if there is surplus water available in the basin, its transfer to other basins may be considered. Such basins should first aim at efficient utilization of all the in-basin resources. ”

In this regard, Telangana has been continuously addressing KRMB and Ministry of Jal Shakti (MoJS) to restrain AP from diverting Krishna water to outside basin and give top priority to in basin requirements. During the second apex council meeting, Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao expressed strong objection on diversion of Krishna waters to outside basin while the in basin parched lands are craving for water.

Also read:

NGT directs KRMB team to inspect RLIS without AP’s assistance

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