Krishna Board permits Telangana to use 3 tmcft of water till November 2

The Krishna River Management Board on Friday permitted Telangana to utilise 3 tmcft of water and generate power up to November 2.

Thereafter, it felt that the demand for power would come down as the kharif season has come to an end and the power requirement would also come down significantly. It also decided to meet again on November 15 to review the situation.

The decision of the Board today comes in the backdrop of both the warring states of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh raising their respective concerns about power generation and voicing against it, as power generation would have adverse impact on the water storage in the major reservoir.

With the Telangana Government generating power from the Srisailam hydel power project, AP raised objections. It also raised concerns about the depletion of water level in the Srisailam reservoir leading to far reaching consequences. The Government orders in the past were passed to utilised water optimally for various regions. It is necessary to store water at certain minimum draw down level to supply water to some parts of the State

Based on the concerns expressed by both the States and meeting with the Chief Ministers, the Krishna Board chaired by SKG Pandit convened a meeting of representatives of both the States on Wednesday, where the meeting ended in a stalemate. It met again to continue to hold discussions on Thursday and today it came out with its directive to Telangana on usage of water resources. And decided to review the situation again next month and also revisit the long term supply issues and sharing approach between the two States. As agreed earlier, the existing orders stay till they are considered.

Following the developments, the Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao has convened a review meeting to take stock of the situation.

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