Flows in Godavari yet to catch up with those in Krishna
Hyderabad: The Krishna River, in spate over the past few days, has nearly filled the Jurala reservoir in Telangana, the Srisailam reservoir in Andhra Pradesh and the Nagarjunasagar that the two states share, presenting a stark contrast to the Godavari River, the other main river in Telangana, which has little water.
Copious rain in the catchment areas of the Krishna River in Karnataka and Maharashtra over the past couple of weeks have resulted in heavy inflows into the river, with additional flows from the Tungabhadra joining near Sangameswaram in the backwaters of the Srisailam reservoir.
According to inflow data on Monday evening, around 50,000 cusecs of water were being added to the Krishna River from the Tungabhadra, resulting in the Srisailam dam receiving 3.96 lakh cusecs of water, with the level reaching 883 feet against its full reservoir level of 885 feet.
With more inflows expected in the days to come, the dam authorities are releasing 4 lakh cusecs from Srisailam. As of Monday evening, the downstream Nagarjunasagar was receiving 3.23 lakh cusecs, of which it was releasing 1.63 lakh cusecs after opening 16 gates by Monday evening.
On the other hand, the Godavari River is yet to see the kind of heavy inflows being experienced in the Krishna. Inflow data showed that the Sriramsagar, Kaddam Narayan Reddy and Sripada Yellampally projects recorded inflows of 16,229 cusecs, 1,433 cusecs, and 8,917 cusecs respectively by Monday evening.
In contrast, the Medigadda barrage, downstream of the Yellampally reservoir, has been letting through all of the 3.73 lakh cusecs of water it has been receiving, with a bulk of the flows coming from the Pranahita River that joins the Godavari before it reaches Medigadda.
All the gates at the Medigadda barrage, as well as those at the Annaram and Sundilla barrages on the Godavari that lie between Medigadda and Yellampally, have been kept open following instructions from the National Dam Safety Authority (NDSA) in view of the damage they have sustained.
The authority indicated that storing water at these three barrages, which are part of the Kaleshwaram project, could result in further damage to the barrages.
Officials said the Godavari could see increased inflows in the days to come with reports of increased rainfall in the river’s catchment areas in Maharashtra.