Delayed inflows into Jurala derail hopes of farmers

Mahbubnagar: With no adequate rains in the upper catchment areas of Krishna River, the inflows in Jurala project located in Gadwal district of erstwhile Mahbubnagar are getting delayed with every passing day causing concern among the farmers, who have already lost all their hopes of getting good yields this in this Kharif season.

According to the project engineer of Priyadarshini Jurala Project, even though the rain fall situation last year was also similar, but because of good rains in Karnataka, Jurala Project had got good flows by this time.

"Last year by this time, Jurala project was brimming with full of water, however, this year, with no adequate rains the upstream projects of Krishna River like Narayanpur and Almatti in Karnataka are yet to be filled, unless and until these projects are full, we cannot expect any kind of inflows into Jurala.

As of now there is no inflow into the Jurala project. We expect that at least by next week the projects in upstream Krishna River will reach their full level and then we may receive water downstream into Jurala," hoped N Sridhar, Executive Engineer of Jurala Project.

However, irrigational experts in Mahbubnagar opined that with inflows into the Almatti and Narayanpur reservoirs in Karnataka are dropping drastically, it has dampened the hopes of Telangana farmers, because if the inflows in Almatti and Narayanpur drops, the expectations of releasing water downstream from these projects is very bleak.

"By this time last year, we received water through Kalwakurthy as well as Jurala project through canals and filled all our tanks and ponds and had taken up irrigation.

This year we are neither having the canal water nor good rain rains. We are worried that this season we may have to go for crop holiday," said Gopal Nayak of Wanaparthy district.

Currently, at Almatti, the inflows have come down from earlier 100,000 cusec to 80,000 cusecs during the past few days. It is expected that if there are no rains in the upstream, the inflows into the project may further reduce to 50,000 cusec.

It is said that, if Almatti dam releases water down, it will fill Narayanpur and it will take at least 2-3 week.

However, with reduced inflows in Almatti, the chances of getting good inflows in Narayanpur are very less and even if Narayanpur is full and a minimum of 10,000 cusecs of water comes as inflows every day, the chances of opening the project gates is very less as the Karnataka government will divert the water for its own purposes.

The irrigational experts observed that the hopes of getting inflows into Jurala during first spell of rains in June and July are already lost and all hopes are only on the second spell of rains that occur during August. "This season we hope receive less inflows into Srisailam.

We can expect inflows into Srisailam and Nagarjunasagar only during second spell of rains," observed the Irrigation department officials.