The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh News : Minister accuses Karnataka of violating tribunal award

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Friday, Mar 11, 2005

Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh

Minister accuses Karnataka of violating tribunal award

By Our Special Correspondent

HYDERABAD, MARCH 10. The Major Irrigation Minister, Ponnala Lakshmaiah, has accused Karnataka of violating the Krishna Waters Dispute Tribunal Award in unilaterally going ahead with the construction of a mini-hydel project on RDS.

In a statement laid on the table of the Assembly in connection with a short debate on the issue on Thursday, he said the RDS comprised an anicut across the Tungabhadra and a 143-km left bank line canal. Following the reorganisation of States, the headworks and the initial 42.6 km with an ayacut of 59,000 acres fell within Karnataka and the remaining canal (100.4 km) with an ayacut of 87,000 acres fell in Andhra Pradesh.

As per KWDT Award, the benefits of utilisations under RDS should be shared between AP (15.9 TMC) and Karnataka (1.2TMC).

`Flow will be affected'

Referring to the mini hydel scheme, he said a power canal adjacent to the irrigation canal had been excavated. The power canal had a higher designed discharge capacity of 4765 cusecs as against 850 cusecs of irrigation canal.

"Thus, unless 850 cusecs of flow is ensured, it is apprehended that the flow into the irrigation canal will be affected".

As such, Karnataka's action in going ahead with the construction of a mini hydel scheme, in a joint venture like RDS was a violation of the provisions of the award. He said he had written to his Karnataka counterpart protesting against the project on January 15.

High-level panel

It was also decided to appoint a high-level committee of five experts, which had been directed to submit its report by the month-end.

The Committee members are B.V.S. Prakash Rao, Engineer-in-Chief (Irrigation), T.S. Prakash Rao, Commissioner, Projects, I.S.N. Raju, Chief Engineer, Central Designs Organisation, Routhu Satyanarayana, retired chief engineer and C. Chandra Mohan, Engineer-in-Chief (AW). Promising that all steps necessary to protect the interests of farmers of RDS would be taken, he said that apart from this, the Government had been protesting against illegal constructions taken up by Karnataka at Upper Tunga, Upper Bhadra and in Tungabhadra sub-basin involving appropriation of 75 TMC in violation of the KWDT Award.

Expressing concern that Andhra Pradesh was not able to effectively curb the violations of Karnataka over the years, he urged everyone to stand as one to defend the interests of the State.

Modernisation project

Meanwhile, even as the controversy over the mini-hydel plant rages, the Government announced a Rs. 75-crore programme to modernise the RDS canal system.

In a statement on the budget demands for his department, Mr. Lakshmaiah, stated that the modernisation would cover the entire 103-km stretch of the RDS canal flowing in Mahabubnagar district.

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