“Seeing is believing. Now I know the efforts going into building the Polavaram dam. I am touched by the way every worker is doing his best. It reminds me of the way the bridge was built by the army of Lord Rama to Srilanka,” said Hindupur MLA and actor Nandamuri Balakrishna and congratulated the workers who had come to work on the project from all over the country.
Several MLAs said they were awestruck by the work in progress at the dam site. They said they could never imagine the scale of work.
About 50 MLAs, six Ministers, 15 MLCs and an MP visited the dam site on Thursday. The MLAs visited the site on their way from Amaravati to Visakhapatnam to attend the AgTech Summit. The Assembly and Council, which are in session from November 10, did not sit on Thursday to enable the legislators to visit the dam site.
Balayya springs
a surprise
Mr. Balakrishna surprised all by coming on the trip by the special RTC Amaravati buses from the Chief Minister’s camp office in Vijayawada at 8 a.m. He was later joined by his son-in-law and IT Minister Nara Lokesh.
Mr. Balakrishna and Mr. Lokesh stole the limelight with workers at the dam site who jostled with one another to shake hands with the duo. Mr. Balakrishna also recalled how everyone heckled his father NT Rama Rao when he proposed the Telugu Ganga project. Similarly, Polavaram was also going to become a reality.
P. Vishnukumar Raju, BJP floor leader, said the visit gave legislators a better understanding of things and equipment to fight the Opposition with. The Opposition MLAs were levelling baseless allegations because they had no idea what was taking place. They should also come and see for themselves what was happening at the dam site.
“This is amazing. All dams were built before our time. I have not seen anything like this and I am not going to see anything like this in the future,” said Tadikonda MLA Tenali Sravan Kumar.
The legislators who took their time to reach the dam site making a couple of stops at Denduluru and Koyyalagudem regretted that they did not make it earlier to spend more time at the dam site. The MLAs saw the spillway work, diaphragm wall and fabrication of the radial gates going on simultaneously. Minister for Water Resources Devineni Umamaheswara Rao explained to the MLAs the technical details of the project. Representatives of Bauer explained that they would have to go 300 feet below the river bed at a few points to build the diaphragm wall. Ms. Paritala Sunitha, Kalava Srinivas, Pithani Satyanaryana and K S Jawahar were part of the visitors.
