Telangana wants Krishna board meeting postponed

HYDERABAD: During the high-level meeting convened by Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao on Saturday, it was decided that Telangana would call for the postponement of the proposed three-member committee meeting of Krishna River Management Board (KRMB) from July 9 to anytime after July 20. “The issues of Telangana should be included in the agenda for the Board meeting. The State will send its agenda to the KRMB soon,” Irrigation Department officials at the meeting said.   

It was also decided in the meeting that Telangana would continue hydel power generation at Jurala, Srisailam, Nagarjuna Sagar and Pulichintala till the water was available at these projects. “The KRMB has no right to ask Telangana to stop the hydel power generation,” the officials at the meeting felt, and recalled that there was no agreement between Andhra and Telangana over hydel power generation. Telangana also refuted AP’s “propaganda” that the State was generating power at Pulichintala and releasing the water into the sea.

The water released from Pulichintala should be stored at Prakasam barrage to meet the needs of Krishna district so that Andhra Pradesh could save power while lifting Godavari waters through Pattiseema to Krishna delta, the officials felt.  The officials also said that Telangana was generating hydel power as per the guidelines issued by the Central government to generate 51 per cent “clean energy”. 

“Hydel power would be generated with the water allocated to Telangana only. No one should have any objection to this,” the Chief Minister said at the meeting. Stating that of the total power generated in the State, 40 per cent was being used for lift irrigation schemes, Rao stressed the need for hydel power generation.  

Other key decisions: Water will be released from Jurala left and right canals to fill up tanks, the Sammakka barrage and Sitamma Sagar would be called ‘Irrigation’ and ‘Hydroelectrical’ projects, only employees having ID cards will be allowed into Srisailam dam, security will be beefed up at all the projects across Krishna.