Telangana and Andhra Pradesh fights continue for water sharing on electricity generation

Hyderabad: The on-going tussle between Telangana and Andhra Pradesh over utilising the available water from Srisailam Dam for generation of power by the former continued on Tuesday, with the Krishna River Management Board (KRMB) secretary’s latest missive to Telangana government not giving any specific directions.

On the complaint by the AP government against Telangana on drawing waters from Srisailam dam for hydel power generation, KRMB member secretary R.K. Gupta on Tuesday evening faxed a special message to Telangana principal secretary of irrigation, asking only to adhere to the operation manuals of water releases from the dam without any specific directions on hydel power generation.

“In view of impending water requirements in the coming months for drinking and irrigation needs it is therefore directed that releases for power generation should match the irrigation and drinking water needs and any situation to reach at a reservoir level which result in severe drinking and irrigation water crisis may be avoided,” stated the letter.

Mr Gupta’s letter also reminded that “during the July 10 meeting it was emphasised that existing government orde-rs such as GO 69 and GO 107 have to be honoured”. However, the fact remains that Srisailam MDDL (Minimum Draw Down Level) was fixed at 834 ft in the GO issued by previous government headed by N. Chandrababu Naidu, which was subsequently modified to 854 ft by the Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy government.

Both the GOs contradicting each other on the MDDL level. MDDL means, Water should not be drawn below the level for any use, but time and again several governments have depleted the Sri-sailam dam level below 834 ft and even further below to go up to 770 ft in order to empty the available water in Srisailam dam to downstream Nagarjunasagar dam for protection of crops under it. Water cannot be drawn for Pothireddypadu Head Regulator, which in turn supplies to various projects in Rayalaseema if the water level at Sri-sailam goes below 854 ft.

On Tuesday, the water level touched 858.8 ft and Telangana government continued hydel power generation through its Left Bank Power House (900 MW). “We have received the letter from KRMB member secretary, but it is highly ambiguous and inconsistent, we are not going to stop power generation from Srisailam dam, we are going to reply to the letter tomorrow, we will explain all the technical issues, the two GOs mentioned (GO 69 and 107) are contradicting each other; anyway we will explain our position,” said a senior official from Telangana.

Another problem lies unsolved between the two state governments on the releases of water from NS dam. Since construction of Pulichin-tala dam, the terminal reservoir, was completed recently, it cannot withhold water of 20 TMC ft in the first year. With the present 10.5 TMC capacity of water, already seven villages in Nalgonda district are getting submerged.

Meanwhile, over 6,000 (about five TMC ft) cusecs of Krishna waters is flowing into the sea from Prakasam Barrage at Vijayawada due to heavy releases from Nagarjunasagar dam for generation of power by Telangana government. AP major irrigation minister Devineni Umamaheswara Rao, who visited the Prakasam barrage on Tuesday evening, blamed the Telangana government for misusing the waters of Krishna river without concerning the future irrigation and drinking water requirements in both the states.

He has also said the AP government had made a proposal to supply 300 MW of power from its sources to Telangana to meet their immediate requirements in lieu of stoppage of hydel power generation from both Nagarjunasagar and Srisailam dams.

owever, when contacted Telangana Genco chairman-cum-managing-director Devulapally Prabhakara Rao told this newspaper that AP was only making public statements on supply of 300 MW of power to Telangana but without officially communicating the same.