Telangana: Kakatiya lags by 6000 lakes

Hyderabad: The backlog of work in Mission Kakatiya has been mounting each year as targets have not been met, yet the state government shows no sign of slowing down and taking a more realistic look at the project. The programme to restore minor irrigation tanks and water bodies was launched in 2015 and the target was to complete restoration of 9,500 tanks every year, covering a total of 46,500 tanks in five years. In the last three years, the government has awarded contracts for 23,233 tanks, but work has been completed only on 17,000 so far. While a backlog of over 6,000 tanks of the previous three years already exists, this year the government has identified another 5,000 tanks for the fourth phase. 

The response from contractors is not encouraging as their bills are pending from previous years for work already completed. Though the targets are clearly overambitious, irrigation minister T. Harish Rao is determined to meet them this year and clear the backlog. He has been video conferencing with collectors and irrigation officials in all districts every week to review the progress of the work.

“The backlog is not only on account of failure to take up the work in time. In some cases, contractors did not meet the requisite work standards so we cancelled their contracts. There was a delay in handing the job to the new contractor. Nevertheless, the work on the other tanks is going smoothly. We have learnt from the experience of previous years. We will plug those loopholes this time and meet the full target,” Mr Rao said.