BELAGAVI: How Chief Minister Siddarmaiah will address rising concerns about the inability of successive state governments to ensure effective implementation of major irrigation projects, by setting aside necessary funds, is something people are waiting to see as he presents his record 16th budget on Friday.
On budgetary allocation for the irrigation sector, experts feel the need for a political consensus to increase allocation by at least 25 per cent annually, against the current allocation of Rs 20,000 crore.
“If the government is unwilling to increase allocation, it would not be possible for the state government to achieve its target in the irrigation sector in the next five years,’’ said senior Supreme Court advocate Mohan Katarki, an expert in irrigation and inter-state water sharing issues.
The Central government had announced grants of Rs 5,300 crore for implementation of the Upper Bhadra Project in its 2023-24 Budget, besides declaring it a national project. The state government’s proposal to bring 75,000 acres under irrigation in Chitradurga under the Bhadra project has been put on the back burner as the Centre is yet to release grants.
Despite its promise, the state government is struggling to draw 3.9tmcft water from Goa under the Kalasa-Banduri project, though the Mahadayi Water Dispute Tribunal (MWDT) announced its final award in August 2018. The state government blames the Centre for not granting environment, forest and wildlife clearances to go ahead with the project.
While attributing the government’s lack of political will to implement both these projects, irrigation expert Ashok Chandargi said, “Whether the Chief Minister has any concrete measures to implement Upper Bhadra or Kalasa-Banduri project in his fresh budget remains to be seen.’’
All the repeated announcements made in the last several budgets to expedite implementation of the 3rd phase of Upper Krishna Project (UKP-3) have not helped at all as the revised estimate of UKP-3 is about a whopping Rs 1 lakh crore today, sources said, adding that the estimate of the same project was merely Rs 51 crore in 2017.
“The Justice Brijesh Kumar Tribunal gave its final award for sharing Krishna waters (under UKP-3) between Karnataka and Andhra in 2013. However, the Andhra and Telangana governments objected in the Supreme Court, demanding separate share of water. On the other hand, the Karnataka government insisted that water should be shared with undivided Andhra Pradesh as per the tribunal award. Again, the ball is in the Centre’s court,’’ say experts.
All eyes are on the CM as to how he would deal with the UKP-3 budget allocation as an estimated Rs 35,000 crore is required only for the rehabilitation of people of 22 villages.
The state government claimed in its previous budget that separate project division and two sub-divisions were set up to implement the Mekedatu Balancing Reservoir and Drinking Water Project across the Cauvery river valley. Following objections raised by the Tamil Nadu government for implementation of Mekedatu, the state is expected to clear hurdles to implement this project, which ensures supply of 4.75tmcft to Bengaluru city and adjoining areas, besides generation of 400MW power.
Cost of water utilisation
As of today, the cost of utilising 1tmcft of water is Rs 350 crore.
In 1976, the Krishna Water Disputes Tribunal-I allocated 734tmcft of water annually to Karnataka. However, even after 51 years, the state has not fully utilized its share. The Krishna Water Disputes Tribunal-II later granted an additional 174tmcft, including 130tmcft for Upper Krishna Project (UKP) Stage-III. Implementing the necessary infrastructure for UKP Stage-III alone requires an estimated Rs 75,000 crore, according to Mohan Katarki.
In the Cauvery basin, Karnataka must complete its projects to utilise 284.25tmcft of dependable water, plus 40- 50tmcft from regeneration and surplus flows. The total funding required for irrigation infrastructure exceeds Rs 1.25 lakh crore.