Telangana has requested the Krishna Water Disputes Tribunal-II, chaired by Justice Brijesh Kumar, to rectify the anomaly of only 15% of the cultivable area in the Krishna Basin in the State being provided irrigation with assured water as against 95% in Andhra Pradesh.
Presenting Telangana’s argument before the Tribunal on Friday, senior counsel appearing for the State C.S. Vaidyanathan said given the rainfall variability and uncertainty, crop production is unviable and at least only irrigated-dry (ID) crop is needed to sustain the livelihood of farmers and farm workers in the backward areas of Telangana.
He suggested that greater economy in use of water for irrigation should be considered by A.P. keeping in view the national policy of more crop per drop as Telangana has adopted the method of irrigating about 12,800 acres per tmc ft of water for ongoing projects, while A.P. had earmarked a higher usage of water — one tmc ft for irrigating just 8,400 acres under its existing projects.
The counsel for Telangana also brought to the Tribunal’s notice that KWDT-I Award held that “in equitable allocation, future uses requiring diversion of water outside the basin are relevant but more weight should be given to uses requiring diversion of water inside the basin”. The future projects considered by KWDT-I are projects taken up after September 1960 and it allocated water to only inside basin projects under the head.
However, the erstwhile A.P. had reallocated water to Srisailam Right Bank Canal project instead of reallocating it to inside basin project such as Srisailam Left Bank Canal project. The counsel stressed the need to revise the allocations made to SRBC as per KWDT-I Award.
He also explained before the Tribunal (KWDT-II) how SLBC was deprived water allocation by the erstwhile A.P. while SRBC was taken up from assured water and argued for allocation of dependable water to SLBC, an inside basin project.
Further, he also brought to the Tribunal’s notice how erstwhile A.P. had placed before KWDT-I the demand for water for Jurala in the second priority set of projects and SLBC under set of surplus water based projects, while the projects as K.C Canal and Krishna Delta System with additional areas serving the outside basin were put under first priority set for allocation of dependable water.
Telangana’s argument was also heard by Members of KWDT-II Justice Ram Mohan Reddy and Justice S. Talapatra along with Chairman Justice Brijesh Kumar. The Tribunal posted the further hearing of Telangana’s arguments for July 23 to 25.
Published – May 16, 2025 09:41 pm IST
