Hyderabad: The judicial probe into various aspects of planning, construction and functioning of the Kaleshwaram project’s barrages is set to resume next week with Justice Pinaki Chandra Ghose judicial commission of Inquiry expected to summon several IAS officers, retired and current to questioning.
It may be recalled that Justice Ghose had been conducting public hearings with former and present irrigation department officials so far questioning and cross-examining them on various aspects of the barrages. The next phase of the cross-examinations is expected to be focused on the decision-making processes, and the roles and responsibilities of former and present IAS officers who served, and are holding various positions in the irrigation department.
Several of the irrigation department officials, nearly all of them engineers holding various senior ranks, have already informed Justice Ghose during the cross-examinations that their role in implementing some decisions that eventually led to the current state of disrepair of Medigadda, Annaram, and Sundilla barrages, was in some instances, restricted to following instructions from their higher-ups, including the then chief minister K Chandrashekar Rao, and T Harish Rao, who was the irrigation minister in the BRS government’s first term when the Kaleshwaram project was planned and work on its began.
In the second term of the BRS government when the project’s barrages were put into use, it was Chandrashekar Rao who also held the irrigation portfolio. Some of the senior engineers, both past and present, were unequivocal in informing Justice Ghose during their depositions and cross-examinations that they followed instructions from the then chief minister with respect to operational decisions on the barrages.
The commission has already been provided with a copy of an interim report by the Vigilance and Enforcement Wing which investigated various technical and financial aspects related to the barrages and made some recommendations on action to be taken on officials for lapses, and for dereliction of duty, and implementing decisions without questioning, all of which are believed to have contributed to the cracking up and sinking of a part of the Medigadda barrage, and serious leaks springing up from under all the three barrages.
It is expected that once Justice Ghose completes the cross examination of the IAS officers, he could also issue summons to Chandrashekar Rao, and Harish Rao to appear before him for cross examination.
The term of the Commission of Inquiry, which ended on October 31, has been further extended till December 31 and it is expected that Justice Ghose could wind up the probe and submit the Commission’s report to the state government by the end of this year.
