Heavy rains in the catchment areas of the Krishna and Godavari river networks and copious inflows have filled up major reservoirs, which augurs well for the farm sector across the States of Maharashtra, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.

However, there have been reports of damage to standing crops in some districts across these States due to flooding.

The filling up and fresh flood water flowing into Almatti, Narayanpur, Tungabadhra, Srisailam and Nagarjunagar projects, has also boosted the hydel power generation in some of these dam-based power houses.

With Almatti and Narayanpur on the Krishna in Karnataka releasing more than 2.5 lakh cusecs of water downstream, the Jurala project on the Karnataka and Telangana border has been receiving huge inflows.

With the dam already close to its full capacity, it has been releasing all the water it is getting in downstream to Srisailam dam. The Srisailam dam, which has been receiving water from Tungabhadra, which is already filled up, Jurala and other tributaries of Krishna, is close to its capacity and releasing over 82,000 cusecs to Nagarajuansagar.

The power generation across Jurala, Srisailam, left and right back power houses and at Nagarjunasagar has been a major boon for Telangana and AP.

The Srisailam dam, with full reservoir level of 885 ft and storage of 216 tmc, has water level up at 880 feet. With the Central Water Commission predicting further inflows, it has been letting out water to Nagarjuanasgar wherein the water level has reached 570 feet as against FRL of 590 feet.

Lifting of floodgates

With the reservoirs close to their brim, the irrigation authorities in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh have been forced to release water by lifting the floodgates while also generating power from their pump houses

According to the data from Reservoir Storage Monitoring System, the Srisailam dam has been receiving inflows of 3,28,399 cusecs. If the current inflows continue, the dam will fill up in couple of days.

On the Godavari river network, the dams in Telangana, including the Sriramsagar project, are on on the verge of getting filled up. There has been huge flood water surge at the Bhadrachalam temple where third warning was issued couple of days ago. However, the level has now been receding.

The huge flood flow and water has hampered the construction work on some of the ongoing irrigation projects, including the Kaleshwaram project in Telangana and Polavaram in Andhra Pradesh.

The Sangameshwara temple on the backwater of Srisailam dam is partly submerged.

Evacuation of people

Meanwhile, the AP and Telangana governments have made arrangements to evacuate people in some of the low lying areas close to the river network. While there have been reports of submergence of crop, the filling up of dams augurs well for both kharif and rabi operations and meeting the drinking water requirement across all these States.

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