Harsih Rao Responds On Setarama Project

Minister for Irrigation T Harish Rao on Saturday requested Union Minister for Water Resources Nitin Gadkari to consider Sitarama Lift Irrigation Scheme as an ongoing project instead of a new one.

In a letter to Gadkari, he wanted instructions to be given the Central Water Commission (CWC) to this effect.The Special Chief Secretary to Government (Irrigation and CADA) had already addressed a letter to the Secretary, Ministry of Water Resources, for considering the project as an ongoing one.“Due to technical reasons, certain ongoing projects taken up in the erstwhile Andhra Pradesh government had to be re-engineered after the formation of Telangana State”, he said.

The Sitarama LI project is one of them. It was re-engineered clubbing two projects — Rajiv Sagar and Indira Sagar Dummugudem Lift Irrigation Projects on Godavari river — since the head works of the Indira Sagar Lift Irrigation scheme had gone to the residual State of Andhra Pradesh while the alignment was also passing through the core wildlife sanctuary.

The head works were later shifted to Telangana and the alignment was modified so as to avoid any impact on the core area of the wildlife sanctuary.The re-engineered proposal was sent to the Central Water Commission (CWC) for appraisal which, in turn, was referred to the Godavari River Management Board, he said.