Minister for Irrigation N. Uttam Kumar Reddy holding a meeting on inter-State water issues in Hyderabad on Sunday.
The State government has asked its legal and technical teams to pursue cases on irrigation-related issues before tribunals and courts aggressively to achieve equitable and legitimate share of Telangana in Krishna and Godavari waters.
Minister for Irrigation N. Uttam Kumar Reddy on Sunday took stock of the inter-State issues and cases before the Krishna Water Disputes Tribunal-II and the Supreme Court at a high-level meeting held here.
The meeting was attended by senior counsel representing the State before KWDT-II C.S. Vaidyanathan and his team of advocates, including V. Ravinder Rao, Advisor to State government on Irrigation Aditya Nath Das, Irrigation Secretaries Rahul Bojja and Prashant J. Patil, Engineer-in-Chief B. Nagendra Rao and engineers from the inter-State water resources wing in the Irrigation Department.
Mr. Vaidyanathan briefly explained the status of various issues before the KWDT-II and the Supreme Court and suggested the way forward. On the case relating to KWDT-II award pending before the Supreme Court, he suggested that the State government consult Maharashtra and Karnataka to resolve the issues amicably through dialogue. The Minister agreed to the suggestion and instructed the authorities to take necessary steps in that direction.
On the ad-hoc arrangement of Krishna water sharing agreed upon in 2015 with Andhra Pradesh, the Minister said it was arbitrary and without any basis. Besides, it was agreed only for that year. The meeting decided to pursue the matter before KWDT-II seeking for revision of ratio as 50:50 as ad-hoc measure until the matter is adjudicated by the tribunal.
The Minister reiterated that the State government would not hand over the components of Srisailam and Nagarjunsagar projects and water extraction systems to the Krishna River Management Board (KRMB). He recollected that the government had adopted a resolution in the Assembly on February 12 against handing over of the project components to the river board.
He asserted that necessary steps would be taken by the government to safeguard and protect the water rights and interests of the people of Telangana in the Krishna Basin. The objective of the government was to ensure the legitimate share in Krishna water to Telangana as per the basin parameters to mitigate the distress and hardships faced by Telangana people in the Krishna Basin areas.
