Hyderabad: Chief minister A Revanth Reddy on Sunday said the Kaleshwaram project will not be abandoned and that Medigadda, Annaram and Sundilla barrages will be brought back into use, and also promised to complete all irrigation projects between Tummidihatti and Bhadrachalam on river Godavari.Telangana stood number one in paddy production in the country, without using a single drop of water from Kaleshwaram in two years. “We are not criticising the previous govt for constructing Medigadda, Annaram and Sundilla barrages. Agencies are examining the changes which may have occurred inside the earth at the barrages. We are taking precautions to prevent any damages in the future. We also constituted an expert committee. Kaleshwaram is not anyone’s property. It was built with public money and it is peoples’ property. We will bring Kaleshwaram back into use,” the CM, who along with irrigation minister N Uttam Kumar Reddy, other ministers and engineers visited the J Chokka Rao Devadula lift irrigation (Devadula project) project site in the combined Warangal district, said.Revanth also announced that a discussion on Godavari river water, projects on it, achievements and failures of the previous BRS govt and the Congress govt on river water issues, would be taken up in the assembly for a day in the ensuing budget session. BRS should stop its false and vicious campaign and should speak truth in the assembly, he added.Later, the CM held a review meeting with the engineers at the project site and told them that the govt would release 600 crore by June 2 for land acquisition, to repair the Devadula project pumps in a month, a special meeting with local MLAs and officials on Devadula would be held during the budget session, special corpus fund for land acquisition would be set up, compensation to affected families would be released through green channel.Speaking on the occasion, Uttam Kumar Reddy said the Devadula project would be completed by Dec 2027, with the project expected to boost agriculture and drinking water security in north Telangana.Uttam Kumar Reddy said the govt was prioritising the long-delayed project, which was started in 2001.The minister said that once operational, the project would deliver irrigation water to nearly six lakh acres across Hanumakonda, Warangal, Karimnagar, Jayashankar Bhupalpally, Mulugu, Jangaon, Yadadri-Bhuvanagiri, Suryapet, and Siddipet, and would also supply drinking water to rural areas in upland and drought-prone regions.
