RAMADUGU (KARIMNAGAR): Irrigation Minister T Harish Rao has set deadlines for various works of the Kaleshwaram lift irrigation scheme (KLIS).Interacting with a team of visiting reporters at Package 8 of KLIS here on Monday, he said the Medigadda to Mid-Manair link should be completed by Dasara this year. Medigadda is the source where Godavari water will be lifted for irrigating 18.25 lakh acres of a new ayacut and stabilisation of 18.75 lakh acres, a total of 37 lakh acres.
The Godavari water lifted at Medigadda will be supplied to Yellampalli project and from there to Mid-Manair. If the 120-km stretch of Medigadda-Mid-Manair, Link-1 and Link-2 works are connected, then 50 per cent of the work of KLIS will be over. The entire project is divided into 7 links and 28 packages.
“The Link 1 and Link 2 will be completed by Dasara and we will be giving water to around 15 lakh to 20 lakh acres of ayacut this year,” Harish Rao said, adding that it was the commitment of chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao to complete the irrigation projects in two to three years’ time. “Normally, construction of big irrigation projects took decades to complete in the past in the country. Telangana showed a new direction to the country’s irrigation sector by completing KLIS in a record time,” Rao claimed.