HYDERABAD: The witness for Telangana before the Krishna Water Disputes Tribunal (KWDT) Ghanshyam Jha said on Tuesday that the irrigation projects mentioned in the AP Reorganisation Act 2014 were not exhaustive. Jha said that the Schedule-XI of the AP Reorganisation Act, 2014 was only a guideline for the functioning of Krishna River Management Board (KRMB) and Godavari River Management Board (GRMB). “Acknowledgement of Parliament approval is not implied by mere mention of the project which is not exhaustive and inclusive of all such projects,” he said.
During the cross-examination before the KWDT on Tuesday, AP advocate R Venkataramani said that the importance of Telugu Ganga (29 tmc), Handrineeva Sujala Sravanthi (40 tmc), Galeru-Nagari Sujala Sravanthi (38 tmc), and Veligonda (43.50 tmc) for the State of Andhra Pradesh in the context of water sharing arrangements had been duly acknowledged by the Parliament by putting these projects in the Schedule-XI of the AP Reorganisation Act.
In reply, the TS witness said that the projects listed in the Schedule-XI were not exhaustive. To another question, Jha said that TS suffered historical injustices in water allocations. During the cross examination by AP advocate R Venkataramani before the KWDT, Jha said, “The state had planned gravity flow projects to irrigate Telangana areas by Bhima project (100.7 tmcft), upper project (54.4 tmcft) and Tungabhadra project (19.2 tmcft), totalling to 174.3 tmcft.
But, the erstwhile Andhra Pradesh has not pursued it properly with Krishna Water Disputes Tribunal-1. As a result, the area has to be planned necessarily through lift irrigation,” Jha said. The reason for the lifting of water was that Telangana State in Krishna basin is at a relatively higher elevation.