Telangana Files Petition Against Rayalaseema LIP

In another escalation of the seemingly never-ending water feud between the two Telugu states, the Telangana government today filed a contempt petition with the National Green Tribunal (NGT) against the Andhra Pradesh government for its failure to submit reports on the Rayalaseema Lift Irrigation Project (LIP).

Additional advocate general of the state Ramachandra Rao filed the petition on behalf of the KCR regime.

During the hearing of the matter, Rao told the NGT that the Telangana government had filed the contempt petition as the AP government had not submitted any inspection reports of the project. He claimed that the officials of the Krishna River Management Board (KRMB) and the Union Environment Ministry had visited the project site as per the orders of the NGT, but that despite this, no report had been submitted yet.

The additional AG also told the body that the officials concerned had failed to submit their reports on the LIP because the Jagan government had not allowed them to carry out the inspections of the project site. He then urged it to intervene in the matter to enable the inspection to be carried out.

Further, Rao appealed to the NGT to hear the contempt petition filed by the state alongside a similar petition filed earlier by G Srinivas.

(Srinivas had filed a contempt petition as well. In it, he had alleged that the AP government was violating the norms mediating the construction of irrigation projects against the orders of the NGT by proceeding with the construction of the same. This had prompted the NGT to warn the government that it would send Chief Secretary Adityanath Das to jail if all illegal irrigation project works were not stalled immediately.)

At this, the tribunal told him that the issue of the Rayalaseema LIP was under their consideration, and added, before adjourning the hearing, that it would hear the case on July 23.