Telangana: KRMB team cancels visit to RLIS

Hyderabad: The scheduled visit of the officials of Krishna River Management Board ( KRMB) to the 'illegal' Rayalaseema Lift Irrigation Scheme (RLIS), which has been taken up by the Andhra Pradesh government to lift river Krishna water from the foreshore of Srisailam, on Thursday has been cancelled.

The board is supposed to visit the project and probe the allegations made by Telangana government that Andhra government was constructing the RLIS without water allocation. It may be mentioned here that AP government was opposing the inclusion of Telangana officials in the KRMB team during the visit.

Official sources said that the Board cancelled the tour as a team of officials from the NGT ( National Green Tribunal ) decided to visit the project on the same day. The Telangana government lodged a complaint with NGT recently against the RLIS and the tribunal instructed the KRMB to take necessary steps to stop the illegal project which would also damage the local ecological system.

Officials said that the NGT team would ascertain the impact of the lift scheme on the ecosystem and make its observations before passing another order against the project.

Meanwhile, Godavari River Management Board ( GRMB ) called an emergency meeting to discuss the action plan to implement the gazette notification issued by the union Jal Shakti ministry recently. The KRMB and GRMB were given extraordinary powers to maintain all projects constructed on the two rivers and also oversee the functioning of the officials of irrigation departments of the two states.