KCR Welcomes Apex Council Meeting On August 25

Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao has welcomed the Centre's decision to hold the Apex Council meeting on August 25.

The CM will send a letter to the Centre communicating his acceptance to participating in the meeting.

The letter will also contain the issues the Telangana government would like incorporated into the agenda.

The CM held a review meeting today at Pragathi Bhavan to finalise the strategy to be adopted at the Apex Council meeting. The Government's Chief Advisor Rajiv Sharma, Chief Secretary Somesh Kumar and Water Resources Advisor S K Joshi, State Planning Commission Vice-Chairman Vinod Kumar, State Rythu Bandhu Samithi President Palla Rajeshwar Reddy, MLC Subhash Reddy, Principal Secretary (Water Resources Development) Rajat Kumar, Principal Secretary to the CM S Narsing Rao, E-in-C Nagender Rao, and officials Koteswar Rao, Prasad, Vijay Kumar, Venkata Narayana and others participated.

Speaking on the occasion, the CM said that all the disputes with and doubts expressed by the Andhra Pradesh government and the Centre on the sharing of river waters with the contiguous state would be clarified and cleared in the meeting.

He also said that the Telangana government would also raise its objections on the water sharing issues at the meeting.

The CM said that the objections raised by the AP government and the Centre had no meaning and were baseless, and instructed the officials concerned to prepare comprehensive information on all the objections that the AP government and the Centre had put forth, so that clarifications could be given on all of them.

The CM claimed that there were no new projects in Telangana and that only the projects approved in united AP had been redesigned to suit to the needs of Telangana, and said that the same argument with proofs should be placed before the Apex Council.

The CM also said that it should be explained at the meeting that Telangana was executing projects in tune with the Bachawat Tribunal Award.

It was also decided in the review meeting that the enhancing of the capacity of Pothireddypadu as well as the new Rayalaseema Lift Irrigation project taken up by the AP government would be strongly opposed at the Apex Council meeting. The CM also instructed the officials to take the AP government to task for "illegally" utilising water from the Godavari and the Krishna rivers in contravention of the Tribunal Award.

The CM said that several complaints had been lodged in the past about "injustices" being meted out to Telangana. He said that all those injustices would be placed before the Apex Council in the proposed meeting on the 25th, and that a request for early justice would be made.