Problems of Tungabhadra canal ignored: farmers

October 24, 2013 12:18 pm | Updated 12:18 pm IST - KURNOOL

The farmers and managing committee representatives of Tungabhadra Low Level Canal are unhappy that the AP and Karnataka governments were not giving due attention to their problems.

The representatives of two governments are likely to meet on Thursday at Bangalore to discuss the proposed parallel canal for High Level Canal that supplies water to Anantapur and Kadapa districts.

The Anantapur farmers led by Revenue Minister N. Raghuveera Reddy could succeed in convincing the Karnataka counterparts for a parallel flood flow canal to augment supply to the HLC which is unable to meet the irrigation demand.

T. Rami Reddy, member of Project Committee of LLC, lamented that the AP government could have taken the issues of LLC and HLC instead of concentrating only on one canal saying the farmers under LLC were also suffering equally due to inadequate supply of water.

The LLC was allocated 24 tmcft for AP area but only six to seven tmcft was reaching the ayacut.

The short supply was on account of diversion of water to unauthorized areas in Karnataka.

The LLC farmers suggested any of the three solutions to overcome the problem which include bypassing the canal from 72 km point to 185 km or enhancing the carrying capacity from 2400 cusecs to 3200 cusecs or widening the canal by five feet.

The LLC canal which is 250 km long from Hospet to AP border flows to a distance of 135 km exclusively in Karnataka and thereafter in Karanataka and AP until 250 km and to a distance of 180 km exclusively in AP.

The canal could be easily bypassed from 72 km to 185 km by avoiding a hump-like curve in the canal.

The distance of the bypass would be not more than 18 km in Karnataka area, they said. The farmers and Project Committee representatives urged the government to take up the outstanding issues of both canals at one go rather than attempting a piecemeal approach.

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.