Naidu Starting Telangana-AP Water Wars: Harish Rao

Telangana Irrigation Minister T Harish Rao on Friday accused Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu of making deliberate attempts to deny Telangana its share of water from Nagarjuna Sagar.

Addressing a press conference, Rao said that Andhra Pradesh had already utilised 43.13 TMC of excess water from Nagarjuna Sagar. Stating that excess utilisation was in violation of all the norms set as per the Bachawat Award and the AP Reorganisation Act, he said that now only 63 TMC of water was left in Nagarjuna Sagar.

He said that Telangana had a right over 229.9 TMC of water, and the AP government had been trying to snatch this through illegal means.

He said that Telangana could consider releasing 5-6 TMC of water to help the farmers of Andhra Pradesh. However, the AP government wanted to take away all the water, which would lead to a drought situation in the Khammam and Nalgonda districts.

Rao stated that the Telangana government had already made several representations to the Centre over the issue. He said that the Telangana government would write a fresh letter to AP government offering an amicable solution.

He alleged that Chandrababu Naidu had been deliberately trying to create problems for Telangana. Despite having surplus energy, Naidu had stopped production and did not supply energy to Telangana during the Rabi season. He was aiming to create a similar crisis in Telangana during the Kharif season, Rao alleged.

Rao said that Naidu's behaviour would hurt the interests of the farmers of both the states.

Meanwhile, the tussle between the irrigation officials of Telangana and AP took a serious turn on Friday. The Telangana officials closed the gates of the Nagarjuna Sagar dam's right canal while preventing the AP government officials from release 6,000 cusecs of water. A large number of police personnel of both the states had been deployed on both sides of the dam.

The trouble started on Wednesday night when AP GENCO officials started releasing water to meet the irrigation needs of the Krishna delta while setting aside the objections raised by the Telangana government. (INN)