VIJAYAWADA: Widening of Pothireddypadu Head Regulator (PHR) is the need of the hour to provide water to several irrigation projects constructed utilising Krishna surplus water in Rayalaseema in view of the decreasing flood days, say irrigation experts from Rayalaseema region.
Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy has already announced his intentions to have PHR widened to enhance discharge capacity to 80,000 cusecs from the existing 44,000 cusecs. His argument is simple and straight forward — the needed water for the projects constructed in Rayalaseema region to cater to drinking and irrigation water needs of the region cannot be supplied with the existing infrastructure, hence there is a need for improving the same and widening of PHR is part of that exercise.
In a recent meeting with irrigation officials, the Chief Minister was informed that upgrading Pothireddypadu Head Regulator and Banakacherla Regulator Complex along with the development of canals will cost about Rs 450 crore.
"There are no two things about the importance of Pothireddypadu Head Regulator to Rayalaseema region, as almost all projects in the region get water through it. Though the people of the region have sacrificed nearly about 80,000 acres for the Srisailam project, there was no allocation of water from the project to the region. How is it justified? Now, when efforts are being made to provide water to the projects, which has to be seen as its rightful share, there should not be any objections," said Kamini Venugopal Reddy, Rayalaseema JAC coordinator and president of Kundu Porata Samithi.
Retired engineer M Subbaraydu said that the argument by the then Congress government over the GO 170 issued in 2005 for widening PHR to enhance discharge capacity from 11,500 cusecs to 44,000 cusecs - that the flood days in Krishna came down from 45 days when various irrigation projects in Rayalaseema region were taken up had reduced to 30 days necessitating the need for widening of PHR - still stands true.
At that time, the government had pointed out that to provide 102 TMC (40 TMC for Telugu Ganga Project, 38 TMC for GNSS and 19 TMC for SRBC) in 30 days, the discharge rate should be 40,000 cusecs per day. It is only possible at 880 feet water level and at 854 feet level, only 3,000 cusecs could be discharged, hence the need for enhancing the PHR discharge capacity.
"In fact, today the situation has further worsened. With the increase in the height of Almatti Dam in Karnataka by five meters to 534, the flood days have further come down. Several projects constructed upstream Srisailam project have worsened the situation. It should also be noted that the holding capacity of the Srisailam reservoir is decreasing every year due to silt formation. As against the actual storage capacity of 308 TMC in 2011, it was only 215 and it should have further decreased today," he said.
Subbarayudu said that widening the Pothireddypady Head Regulator will also become a Srisailam Dam safety measure as the flood pressure on the project will get reduced. He dismissed the arguments of misuse of the PHR stating that KRMB is there to regulate the water utilisation.
"It has already been proposed to divert 80 TMC of water that would be diverted from the Godavari to Krishna through Polavaram. The same amount was to be used for Rayalaseema irrigation purposes. If the proposed diversion of Godavari water from Dummugudem or any other project to Nagarjuna Sagar, it would be more than 160 TMC. Hence, it is justified to increase the capacity of the PHR to allow large volumes of discharge of water," said Bojja Dasaratha Ramireddy of Rayalaseema Saguneeti Sadhana Samithi.