KAKINADA: The water resources minister and East Godavari in-charge minister, Nimmala Ramanaidu, on Friday said as floodwater in Krishna and Godavari rivers has not receded, sand reaches can’t open. Once floodwater is receded, more sand can be available to consumers.
He along with district collector P. Prashanthi made a surprise visit to Vadapalli and Aurangabad in Kovvuru mandal on Friday evening. He held discussions with boatmen and society members and understood their grievances.
He said the NDA government has taken a decision to supply sand free of cost to consumers without creating any hurdles. He said consumers can get sand offline or online and he instructed the revenue, irrigation and mines departments to take steps to supply sand to consumers without hitches.
He said the previous government earned revenues of Rs 30,000 crore to Rs 40,000 crore from sand, but now it is available free of cost. He said a decision would be taken to clear the pending bills on sand excavation during the previous government.
But now, the government would pay the amounts to the societies which are excavating sand from October 13. He said 5,000 tonnes of sand are being excavated from Vadapalli sand reaches and the process should be continued.
He said that if sand is available in all the reaches, there will be no black-marketing in sand. He said as per the NGT guidelines, there is no possibility of excavating sand with a distance of 50 kilometers from the coastline and more sand is being excavated from Kovuru and Rajamahendravaram for the consumers of East and West Godavari districts.
MLAs Muppidi Venkateswara Rao, Bathula Bala Ramakrishna, joint collector S. Chinna Ramudu, RDO R. Krishna Naick, Rani Sushmitha, assistant director of mines D. Phani Bhushan Reddy, Polavaram chief engineer Narasimha Murthy, irrigation SE G. Srinivasa Rao, Kovvuru DSP Dev Kumar and others were present.
