Hyderabad: Telangana finance minister T.Harish Rao stated that contracting agencies must take care of repair work of damaged pump houses of the Kaleshwaram Lift Irrigation Scheme (KLIS) and asserted that the state government would not spend a penny on it.
Responding to questions over the excessive rainfall in the state that caused floods in the Godavari river basin, at the state Legislative Council, Harish Rao said that the Kaleshwaram pump houses were submerged due to a natural disaster, not because of any human negligence.
Stating that the Godavari witnessed unprecedented floods, a phenomenon that occurs once in 500 years, the Minister said, “The Annaram pump houses will be restarted in the third week of September and the Medigadda pump houses in the last week of October.”
In addition, he guaranteed that farmers in Rabi would receive enough water from Kaleshwaram.
According to Rao, the Godavari region received 248 mm of rain between July 8 and July 13 of this year, a five-fold increase over the 43 mm of rain that fell during the same time frame last year.
“The government researched the frequency of floods during the last 500 years when the Kaleshwaram project was developed. In 1986, Godavari had its worst floods, totalling 24 lakh cusecs. However, the Godavari received 29 lakh cusecs this year, he added.
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