KLIS: NDSA awaits preliminary report, to make spot visit this week

Hyderabad: The National Dam Safety Authority (NDSA) is awaiting a report from the technical team of the Telangana Dam Safety Authority before making spot visits to the Medigadda and Annaram barrages of the Kaleshwaram Lift Irrigation Scheme (KLIS) to decide on the future course of action.

After studying the preliminary report and making visits, in the next three to four days, the NDSA will decide whether to carry out repairs at the two barrages or render them useless.

Irrigation department chief engineer K. Sudhakar Reddy said they are awaiting the final report of the technical team and NDSA’s recommendations to carry out grouting works to check seepages in Annaram barrage.

“The seepage of water can be arrested permanently after grouting works and sometimes, it depends on the condition,” he said.

The NDSA visit, on a formal request from the Telangana government, is key to deciding the fate of the projects, given the multiple technical aspects involved in the study of the two barrages.

Despite spending around `1 lakh crore on the KLIS, its utility in the upcoming monsoon season is unlikely, and the Telangana government is also unlikely to push for it to avoid any ill consequences. Irrigation authorities also concurred that they are unlikely to be used in the near future and the project’s future would hinge on the NDSA’s recommendations.

Currently, following leaks, the Annaram barrage emptied 2 tmc ft of water downstream to Dowleshwaram over the past three days.

The Annaram barrage is the second barrage, after the one at Medigadda, to be built on the Godavari as part of the KLIS. The Medigadda barrage was emptied last October, after a few piers of the project sank.

The NDSA is also expected to visit the third KLIS barrage, at Sundilla, to check the quality of works and ascertain whether there was any damage.

Telangana state irrigation minister N. Uttam Kumar Reddy had declared in the Assembly, while presenting a White Paper on irrigation projects, that the entire Kaleshwaram project was in a state of uncertainty due to poor quality of works and imperfect technical studies “done by the political bosses rather than the subject experts”.