KRMB to hold meet on August 27 to fix water row

Amaravati: The Krishna River Management Board (KRMB) has convened its meeting in Hyderabad on August 27 to discuss various issues in the backdrop of the ongoing feud between Andhra Pradesh and Telangana over the utilisation of Krishna water.

Shifting of the KRMB headquarters from Hyderabad to Visakhapatnam is also on the agenda of the meeting.

Board member-secretary D M Raipure has invited the water resources officials of the two states for the meeting.

Providing budgetary support to the KRMB, established by the Union ministry of Jal Shakti in accordance with the AP Reorganisation Act, 2014, is one of the critical items that will come up for discussion at the forthcoming meeting, according to a notice issued by the member-secretary.

The KRMB, way back during its third meeting, had proposed to create a reserve fund of Rs 10 crore but so far the two riparian states have not contributed any amount for it.

Though a budget of Rs 18 crore has been approved for the 2021-22 financial years, the two states have not released any money so far.

"Even after repeated correspondence with both the states, the KRMB did not receive requisite funds. The Board now has a bank balance of only Rs 2.46 crore," Raipure said. The Telangana government released only Rs 3.50 crore last year against its apportioned amount of Rs 8.37 crore. "No funds were received from the AP government in the last two years," he added.

The Board has requested the two states to release Rs 10 crore each immediately to meeting its expenditure.

According to the circulated agenda, the Board meeting would discuss the working arrangement for sharing of Krishna water during 2021-22 water year as Telangana requested an ad hoc sharing ration of 50:50, against the agreed 66:34.

Telangana's request for allowing it to carry over unutilised share of water to the next year and AP's objection to it, would also be discussed, the member-secretary said.

The AP government's complaint against construction of several micro irrigation projects in Telangana and utilization of 175.54 tmc ft of water against the allotted share of 89.15 tmc ft, would also come up for discussion.

Telangana's demand for additional share of 45 tmc ft of Krishna water, since AP was diverting Godavari water to the Krishna basin, and the two states' dispute over hydel power generation are among the other things that the KRMB would try to sort out.