VIJAYAPURA: Another 3 TMC of water from Nagarjuna Sagar will help fill up all the tanks in the Krishna Delta and take care of the drinking water requirements during the summer months, according to Irrigation department Superintending Engineer (Krishna) C Ramakrishna.
Apprising Express of this here on Friday, he added that following talks between the governments of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana in February over the issue of release of water from Nagarjuna Sagar, 3 TMC of water was now being released downstream to meet the drinking water needs of people in Krishna, Guntur and Prakasam districts as well as parts of the West Godavari district, which fell under the Krishna delta.
“Already the water is being released for the past 5-6 days and it will be continued for another 10-15 days. We have requested the Telangana government for another 3 TMC of water to complete the filling up of the drinking water tanks in eastern and western deltas, so there will not be any problem till the onset of monsoon in June,” Ramakrishna said. He said that talks were under progress at both official and ministerial levels to get the additional 3 TMC water released. “Since drinking water is the top most priority for the government, we are confident that the required amount of water will be released,” he added.
“Whatever water is being released from Nagarjuna Sagar now is being stored at Pulichintala and will be released through canals to both eastern and western deltas,” Ramakrishna said.
“There are some 350 water tanks in the Eastern Delta (Krishna and parts of West Godavari) and 200 water tanks in the Western Delta (Guntur and Prakasam districts). Most of them have a capacity to store water for 45 to 60 days and in some case even 70 days.
Experts say that there should be continuous flow of water in the canals till the tanks are filled, which means more than the total capacity of these tanks water needs to be released as certain amount of water will get evaporated on the way. Water travels several kilometers before it reaches the tanks.