Bandi Sanjay Kumar urges Javadekar to stop Telangana from bypassing norms

Hyderabad: Telangana State Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) chief Bandi Sanjay Kumar sought the intervention of Union Minister of Environment and Forests and Climate Change, Prakash Javadekar to prevent loss to the public exchequer on account of irrigation projects in Telangana.

In a memorandum submitted to the union minister in Delhi on Saturday, Sanjay said that Telangana has taken up several irrigation proje2cts on the inter-state rivers of Godavari and Krishna.

As per the procedure, the DPRs are appraised by MoJS (Ministry of Jal Shakti) and approved by them based on merit. It was only, then, that the state can seek Environmental and Forest clearances from MoEF&CC.

Sanjay further alleged that Telangana is not following the laid-out norms and procedures. He said that they are not submitting the DPRs to MoJS for appraisal. He said that the reason for non-compliance is, "the DPRs by the TRS party led Telangana government are prepared for the benefit of the contracting firms executive the project. In turn, illegally benefitting from the firms executing the works, he alleged.

The Karimnagar MP accused that the techno-economic viability of the projects is not being considered thus denying the people the intended benefits from these projects. If these DPRs were to be appraised by MoJS, then these irregularities in the DPRs would come out.

For this reason, the State government is not submitting the DPRs to MoJS for their appraisal and approval, he added.

Sanjay Kumar said that the State government is taking recourse since the approval from MoJS is advisory in nature. Therefore, they are conveniently avoiding submitting DPRS to MoJS and directly submitting them for obtaining environmental clearance from the MoEF, as the submission is statutorily mandated.

However, the MoEF gives its clearance scrutinising the issues related to the environment and forests, without concerning the approvals from the MoJS.

Taking advantage of this, huge amounts of public exchequer are being misappropriated because of the reported cost escalations in the DPRs with the connivance of the executing private firms and higher echelons in the TRS led State Government.

Sanjay asked the Union Minister that mandatory approvals by the MoJS be built into the mandate of Expert Appraisal Committee of MoEF for considering the environmental clearances of any such projects of Telangana on rivers Godavari and Krishna. Though it may require amendment in the relevant Statute, the TS BJP chief stressed the need for the same pun in place to foreclose the embezzlement of huge amounts of public exchequer.