HYDERABAD: Irrigation minister N. Uttam Kumar Reddy on Wednesday ordered fast-tracking the Srisailam left bank canal (SLBC) tunnel work and its completion by the December 2026 deadline set by the Congress government.
The SLBC tunnel is designed to transport 30 tmc ft of water a year from the foreshore of the Srisailam reservoir, and can deliver 4,000 cusecs of water. Once completed, the 44-km tunnel will be the world’s longest irrigation tunnel without any intermediary audit tunnels.
There is no lifting of water using pump sets as the tunnel will allow water to flow from Srisailam reservoir into Nalgonda district using gravity.
The urgency to complete the project is related to the pending boring of 9.559-km, work on which had come to a halt due to delays related to repairs to the tunnel boring machines. Representatives of JP Associates, the agency executing the project, and its US-based partners, informed the minister that critical components are being imported to expedite completion of the project as per the deadline.
Chairing a review meeting at Jal Soudha on irrigation projects in Devarakonda and Miryalaguda Assembly constituencies, Reddy said that the government has issued orders releasing `4,637 crore for completion of the project. He also said that the SLBC high-level canal, for which lining will be taken up at a cost of Rs 440 crore, will provide irrigation to nearly four lakh acres.
The minister called for a thorough probe into constructions of check dams during the BRS regime, alleging that they were built without due diligence, were poorly planned and without assessments of location, water availability and viability. Many such check dams have been washed away or have been damaged, he said.
Alleging a major scam, Reddy said that those responsible must be held accountable, adding that for instance, in Huzurnagar constituency, where a check dam initially sanctioned for a wide stream was later relocated to a narrower site, but the bill was claimed based on the original estimate.
