Dasara brings good days for Andhra Pradesh

Amaravati: With the Central control over the two lifelines of the State to begin from Thursday, Andhra Pradesh is eagerly awaiting the arrival of "good days". The Centre had notified the takeover of the two river boards - KRMB and GRMB - recently and set a deadline of October 14, a day ahead of Dasara, to begin with its new management set-up.

In fact, the AP government has been keen on ending 'Telangana monopoly' over the rivers and living at the mercy of the upper riparian State for its water needs. With the notification of the jurisdiction over the two Boards, the AP government heaved a sigh of relief.

Except for minor hiccups, the AP government has no objection to the takeover of the river boards by the Centre as it would relieve it with the headache of pleading with the "unfriendly" neighbour often, sources in the AP Irrigation Department said. "Some minor changes to the Central GO should be made like non-inclusion of canals in its jurisdiction, etc. The overall control of the management of the river flows and other technical issues will do. We will keep raising the issues till a satisfactory process is put in place," the officials said.

Regarding Telangana objections and its firm stand against the takeover, the AP government is sure that the Centre would sort it out in its favour.

AP has been objecting to "the belligerent attitude of the State of Telangana regarding operation protocol of common reservoirs of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana on the river Krishna and Godavari." It has accused Telangana of blatantly violating the provisions of APR Act 2014 and it "was acting in a whimsical fashion with utter disregard to the operational protocols and directions of the KRMB causing a lot of distress to the State of Andhra Pradesh depriving us of our rightful share of water and wasting precious water letting into Bay of Bengal".

AP had also objected to the "illegal projects of Telangana" while insisting on its share of waters. AP is of the view that the Centre should keep a strict vigil on Telangana moves and disallow it from continuing its illogical and inimical attitude towards it. "We will be keenly watching the progress of the new arrangement, including all its technical arrangements and hope that this would put an end to the water theft of Telangana" sources pointed out.