Reservoirs continue to receive inflows, Telangana wants study on Polavaram's impact on Bhadrachalam

HYDERABAD: Reservoirs of all major projects in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh are receiving copious inflows with heavy rains lashing Telangana and its upper riparian States incessantly.

Concerned over the increase in the backwaters of the Polavaram project in Andhra Pradesh, Telangana sought a study on the impact of the project on its territory, particularly the temple town of Bhadrachalam.

At Srisailam dam on Tuesday morning, the inflows were 9,002 cusecs and the level of water was 813.94 feet, at Nagarjuna Sagar the inflows were 4,407 cusecs, and outflows were 10,647 cusecs. The Priyarshini Jurala Project was receiving 15,000 cusecs and 1,500 cusecs of water was released to Nettempadu lift.

At Pulichintala the inflows were 4,322 cusecs and Prakasam barrage was receiving 9,560 cusecs and almost the same amount of water had been released into the Bay of Bengal.

On the other hand, almost all the projects in the Godavari basin also received heavy to moderate inflows bringing huge quantities of flood water to Bhadrachalam, Polavaram and Dowleswaram. The water level at Bhadrachalam receded a bit to 36.70 feet giving respite to the people living on the banks. At the Lakshmi barrage of Kaleshwaram Lift Irrigation, 75 gates out of 85 were lifted and water was released to Sundilla. At Sripada Yellampalli the inflows were 47,738 cusecs, and SRSP was receiving 23,928 cusecs of Godavari water.

PPA asked to study the impact

C Muralidhar, the Engineer-in-Chief of Telangana Irrigation and CAD department dashed a letter to the chief executive officer of Polavaram Project Authority (PPA) on Monday, to address the impact of backwaters of the project on Telangana, Odisha, and Chhattisgarh.

He pointed out that the PPA, despite several requests and the Supreme Court’s direction did not take up the study following the adverse effect of the floods on Bhadrachalam and surrounding villages in the 2022-23 monsoon floods. The ENC said that floods caused by the spillway level of Polavaram submerged 28,000 acres.

Pegging the total discharge of Polavaram at 7,38,262 cusecs, Telangana urged the PPA to immediately take up protection measures to avoid submergence in Telangana. The ENC requested the PPA to lift all 48 gates of the spillway and sluice gates to release flood water downstream.