Congress Seeks Judicial Probe Into Submergence Of KLIS Pump House

Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC) President & MP N Uttam Kumar Reddy demanded a judicial probe into the submergence of the pump house of the Mahatma Gandhi Kalwakurthy Lift Irrigation Scheme at Yellur village in Nagarkurnool district in the rising backwaters of the Srisailam reservoir.

Addressing a press conference, Reddy claimed that the submergence had led to an explosion of the pumps, and that those explosions had led to the submergence of the pump house inundating 10 out of its 14 floors within 20 minutes.

He said that the damage was so enormous that it would hit the water supply to the farmers in that Ayacut.

He alleged that the entire incident, resulting in loss of property worth thousands of crores, was a man-made mistake, and completely avoidable.

He pointed out that an expert committee, constituted by the present government, had submitted a report on 20th June, 2016, making several recommendations for the safety of the pump house. However, the state government had ignored the recommendations and carried out underground works of the Palamuru Rangareddy Lift Irrigation Project within a 400-metre radius of the KLIS pump house.

Reddy said that Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao should accept the responsibility for the entire damage as he held the irrigation portfolio.

He also said that the irrigation projects in Telangana were not filling farms with water, but the pockets of the TRS leaders with cash from the commissions they were getting from the contractors.

He alleged that sub-standard and inferior quality works had been done in the Kaleshwaram, Mid-Maniar and Konda Pochamma projects, and that they were starting to hurt. He said that several employees being killed and property worth hundreds of crores being damaged in the fire accident in the Srisailam Power Plant recently was an example. And even before people could forget that incident, the KLIS pump house had now gotten submerged.

"We don't know how many more people will lose their lives and how much more public money will be lost due to the inefficiency of KCR," he said.

The TPCC chief demanded that the incident should be probed in a fair and transparent manner. He said that a judicial probe should be conducted to identify the causes, and those responsible for the incident should be punished.

He also condemned the arrest of the Congress leaders who had tried to visit the KLIS pump house.