In a major development, the Centre has released Rs 112 crores as financial assistance to the Devadula project in Telangana, according to information.
Irrigation Minister T Harish Rao had a few days ago urged the Centre to offer better funding for the State's irrigation projects besides timely support to obtain more loans from NABARD for their speedy completion. Rao's efforts appear to have borne fruit with the Centre keeping its commitment to fund the Devadula project.
The Union water resources department has released the funds as it had taken up the Devadula project under the Accelerated Irrigation Benefit Program (AIBP).
With this, the much-awaited works of the project in the Warangal district will be completed soon. Slated to be completed by 2017, the Devadula project draws water from the Gangaram village in the Naxalite-infested Eturu Nagaram mandal of the Warangal district, and will irrigate 6.21 lakh acres of upland drought-prone areas in the Karimnagar, Medak, Warangal and Nalgonda districts.
The project will utilise 38.18 TMC of the 467.24 TMC water available at the intake point in the river Godavari.