HYDERABAD: The state Cabinet on Friday not only approved a proposal to accord statutory status to the Hyderabad Disaster Response and Assets Monitoring and Protection Agency (HYDRAA), but also decided to empower the agency to carry out its task of removing encroachments in FTLs and buffer zones of water bodies and protect them.
The Cabinet meeting, chaired by Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy, also took some crucial decisions on various issues. Following the meeting, Ministers Ponguleti Srinivasa Reddy, N Uttam Kumar Reddy and Komatireddy Venkat Reddy briefed the media.
Srinivasa Reddy said: “The Cabinet decided to give to HYDRAA the powers and rights given to municipalities, corporations and other departments to protect lakes in core Hyderabad, that is inside the Outer Ring Road. The Cabinet decided to relax the rules accordingly.”
There are 27 urban local bodies and 51 recently-merged villages inside the ORR, the minister said, adding that this decision will empower the agency even more.
The Cabinet also approved sanctioning 129 officers to HYDRAA and to send 946 employees from other departments to the agency on deputation. In another major decision, the Cabinet approved the revised estimates of the SLBC project. The original cost at the time the project was sanctioned in 2005 was Rs 2,800 crore which has now been revised to Rs 4,637 crore.
Bonus on superfine paddy from this Kharif season
Uttam said: “SLBC is a long-pending project. The Cabinet decided to give two years time to the contracting agency to complete the project. The outer time limit to complete this project is September 2027.”
Terming the SLBC as historic developmental work, Uttam said that yearly, around 30,000 tmcft of water will be drawn from Srisailam project and 3-4 lakh acres will be irrigated in erstwhile Nalgonda district alone.
“Every month, tunnel work of about 400 metres will completed. Of the 40-km tunnel 9.5 km is pending,” he said.
Criticising the previous BRS government, Uttam said: “Previous government spent Rs 1 lakh crore on Kaleshwaram project which could not irrigate even one lakh acres. But, in case of SLBC, even the revised estimate is Rs 4,637 crore, it will irrigate 3-4 lakh acres. Notice the difference. Also, there will not be recurring costs on SLBC as the water will flow through gravity.”
The Cabinet also decided to pay Rs 500 bonus on superfine variety of paddy from this kharif. For this purpose, the Cabinet approved Rs 2,500 crore.
Uttam said: “This Rs 500 will be additional on MSP. In kharif season, we expect the yield to touch 1.43 lakh metric tonnes (MT). Of this, about 80 lakh MT will be superfine paddy and 50 MT coarse paddy. Next month new ration cards will be issued and from January 2025, superfine rice will be distributed through the PDS outlets.”
