A team of the Central Water Commission (CWC) that inspected ongoing works on Kaleshwaram lift irrigation scheme in the last two days has, while expressing utmost satisfaction at the project design, felt a lot of efforts were still needed at the first barrage near Medigadda which was still in the initial stage of execution.
The team, headed by Chief Engineer, Project Appraisal Organisation of CWC, C.K.L. Das inspected the project site for the purpose of giving CWC clearance.
Mr. Das told a media conference here on Wednesday that water availability at Medigadda where 284.3 tmc ft was proposed to be stored was not an issue but completion of work in a time bound manner. The challenge was to complete the work without cost escalation. Checking the time and cost overrun was a challenge for the executing agencies.
He added that the team was in the State after the government submitted the detailed project report (DPR) to the CWC. It came to understand feelings about the project and was overwhelmed at the response. The real test of works was to see if the government would pump water from Medigadda to mid-Manair in May–June and successfully stabilise an ayacut of 18 lakh acres as envisaged in the DPR.
To a question by Special Chief Secretary (Irrigation) S.K. Joshi, Mr. Das agreed the project was unique, going by the number of structures, vision, benefit envisaged and scale of work. He had never seen work of such magnitude. He said he was impressed at the barrage sites, open canals and tunnelling of work. To lift water from an elevation of 150 mts up to a height of 500 mts for irrigating the command area required lot of efforts.
Answering questions from media persons, Mr. Das said the project lacked navigation system of small barrages en route but there were many other novel features. For such a mega project, he warned that issues will crop up if one loose end was left. They should be tagged right in time. The project will cross the first milestone in the next monsoon.
Director, Hydrology (CWC), N.N. Roy said the commission had already accepted the hydrology proposed for the project. Director, Project Appraisal (South), N. Mukherjee and Director, Cost Appraisal, Rajiv Kumar were present.
