Congress asks KCR to oppose proposed increase of Alamatti dam height

Hyderabad: Concerned over the development in neighbouring State of Karnataka which could impact Telangana's irrigation, the Congress party asked KCR to intervene and act against the proposed increase of height of Alamatti dam from 519.6 m to 524.2 (to about 5 mts) by Karnataka government in best interests of the State.

In a letter addressed to Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao, Secretary AICC & former MLA Ch Vamshi Chand Reddy and M Kodanda Reddy, Vice-President, All India Kisan Congress Secretary elaborated on how the increase of height at the Alamatti dam would cause damage to Telangana on long run.

"Factually, if the height of the dam is increased by 4.6 mts at once, Karnataka that has so far been using 173TMCs will now be able to use 303TMCs of water," he argued.

In this regard, the Water Resource Minister of Karnataka has mentioned that the Karnataka government is ready to spend Rs 32,000 cr for land acquisition and Rs 61000 cr for the entire project. "We would like to recall the statement given by the Indian Institute of Science-Bangalore, based on the Bachawat Tribunal allocations, that a height of 518.7mts would be enough for Alamatti dam.

The leaders recalled that floods had occurred only once since the formation of Telangana state in 2014 and the reservoirs of Jurala, Srisailam, Nagarjuna sagar in Telangana built on the river Krishna, will get filled only during floods.

"In case Alamatti's height is increased, it will allow Karnataka state to store an additional 130TMCs of flood water which will subsequently impose a risk to Nettempadu, Kalwakurthy, Palamoor Rangareddy, Dindi, SLBC, AMRP projects of Telangana that are based on surplus water and a major source of irrigation to 27.4 lakh acres of south Telangana erstwhile districts of Mahabubnagar, Ranga Reddy, Nalgonda.

"We could also stop getting the Brijesh Kumar tribunal's verdict from getting notified by fighting collectively amidst all odds.

It is high time we keep our political interests aside and fight together, with a collective conviction, in the interest of our state which would otherwise incur huge loss to both the downstream states, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh," the leaders urged in the letter.