Vanakalam prospects uncertain as water levels dip in major irrigation projects

The inflows into common irrigation projects of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana remained almost dismal last year and there was no let up in the situation so far this year.

Hyderabad: The Vanakalam (Kharif) operations in the State are facing an uncertain prospect. Almost all the major and medium irrigation projects barring Jurala are yet to receive the first inflows of water. The continued water woes owed to the largely deficient rainfall in catchments of the projects in June. The inflows into common irrigation projects of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana remained almost dismal last year and there was no let up in the situation so far this year.

The scarcity conditions are likely to impact sowings under irrigation sources. The live storage in the irrigation projects is lower compared to last year. The State government is yet to have contingency plans in place to address these adverse conditions. Let down by the projects, farmers in the command area are waiting for the skies to open up. They are looking forward to the government to finalize the project wise irrigation schedules, but it remained a remote possibility at this stage.

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The water level in Nagarjuna Sagar project dipped to 504 ft, six feet below minimum draw down level of 510 feet this year. A crop holiday was declared under the project for both the Vanakalam and Yasangi seasons last year as the total inflows received by the project was much less than the water required to meet the drinking water needs of the twin cities and three districts in its command area. The live storage in the project as on Wednesday (June 19) was 122 TMC as against the gross storage capacity of 312.05 TMC. It would require about 190 TMC of water to find the project full to the brim once again. The Nagarajuna Sagar left canal has an ayacut of over 6.16 lakh acres to be fed in Telangana during the Vanakalam season.

The left canal has its ayacut spread over to Tiruvur area in Andhra Pradesh too. It was only in 2022 that the ayacut was given water in the month of July. There were instances wherein the water release was scheduled even in the month of September and October in the past. The project which was under the operational control of the Telangana government till last year, has gone into the hands of the Krishna River Management Board. The project had 149 TMC feet of water as part of its live storage on the same day last year as against 120 TMC this year. Water levels in the Srisailam project have fallen to 813 feet. The project was left with barely 36 TMC of water. It could receive 5.10 TMCas inflows during the last three days. The Jurala project had received 6.56 TMC of water during the last three weeks holding out some hope to the farmers in its command.

The project received little over one TMC in May last with the Karnataka government making emergency releases from its Narayanpur dam in response to the State government’s request. The project has 9.03 TMC of water as part of its live storage as against it gross storage capacity of 9.66 TMC. As for the Godavari basin projects, with the Kaleshwaram Lift Irrigation Project barrages at Medigadda, Annaram and Sundilla being emptied to facilitate interim repairs, there was no supplementation to Sripada Yellampalli for the last four months. Yellampalli was left with only 4.21 TMC of water as against the gross capacity of 20.18 TMC. The Sriram Sagar project was left with 8 TMC of water as against the gross storage capacity of 90 TMC.

The live storage in Nizam Sagar project had come down to four TMC as against the gross storage capacity of 17.80 TMC. Mid Manair and Lower Manair projects were left with five TMC each and the water will be utilised mainly for drinking water purposes till adequate supplementations were received from upstream projects, officials said.