Vijayawada: Andhra Pradesh and Telangana state are expected to face shortage of drinking water this summer especially in May if the Telangana state government continues to draw water from Nagarjunasagar dam to generate hydel power defying directions from the Krishna River Management Board (KRMB) not to do so.
The Telangana state government has been drawing 3,000 cusecs to 7,000 cusecs per day at Nagarjunasagar to generate hydel power from the dam’s main power house for some time. Though the AP government has raised concern over it and even complained to the KRMB to direct the TS government to refrain from drawing water, there seems to be no response from the latter.
At present, the water level at the Nagarajunasagar dam has been recorded at 543 ft against full reservoir level (FRL) of 590 ft and the current storage of water is 194 tmc ft (62.44%) against the FRL of 312 tmc ft. While the water inflow has been recorded at 5,192 cusecs the outflow was recorded at 17,501 cusecs. Of the 194 tmc ft of water available, nearly 131.66 tmc ft of water is kept as dead storage and this means, only 62.34 tmc ft of water is available for irrigation, drinking water and power generation purposes.
Though the water being discharged from Nagarjunasagar goes into Pulichintala project and further into the Prakasam barrage both get filled to the brim and the excess water goes waste into the sea.
In AP, people living in the two erstwhile districts of Guntur and Prakasam rely upon Krishna water for cultivation and also for being which is pumped through Nagarjunasagar right main canal. Water is supplied in three spells with each spell spread over three to four months in a year. Now, with harvesting of crops over, the demand goes up for drinking water as the summer heat peaks in May. Nearly 20 tmc ft of water is required for drinking water needs in both the districts and the authorities fill all the summer storage tanks for supply.
Authorities say that the Telangana state also draws water from the dam to supply drinking water to Hyderabad especially in summer and if the water levels deplete in the dam, it will also face a water crisis like AP.
Authorities says there is also no chance of inflows into the dam from upstream projects during summer, hence the continued withdrawal of water by the Telangana state to generate hydel power will hit both the states hard.
Hence, the AP authorities have sought the intervention of the KRMB to prevail upon the Telangana state to stop withdrawal of water from the dam.
Nagarjunasagar right main canal executive engineer Y. Srihari said, "We are getting ready to release Krishna water to meet drinking water needs of people living in erstwhile Guntur and Prakasam districts shortly and if the Telangana state government continues to draw water for hydel power generation, water in the dam gets depleted and AP and TS may face water crisis as both of them rely upon Krishna water from the Nagarjunasagar dam."
