As part of its plans to strengthen the operation and maintenance (O&M) wings in all major and medium irrigation projects in the wake of increasing workload, the State government has decided to increase the cadre strength in the coming months.
The cadre strength is likely to be increased with the help of recruitment after making internal adjustments of the qualified personnel. The State government has already prepared a tentative list of proposed increase of cadre in major and medium irrigation projects by sending proposals to the administrative heads of all such projects to cross-check the requirement one more time.
Apart from flood gates, and pump and generator operators, the O&M cadre includes work inspectors, electricians, fitters, and helpers-cum-lascars. Sources in the irrigation department told The Hindu that the existing O&M cadre strength was 174 in 16 major irrigation projects. However, 114 of the cadre are helpers-cum-lascars followed by 30 operators and 25 work inspectors.
“Except for Nagarjunasagar and Sriramsagar projects, where the O&M cadre strength of all categories was 63 and 50, respectively, the staff handling the all-important task is very little,” a senior engineer explained and pointed out that it was only 16 for Jurala and 12 for Kaddam projects having localised ayacut of over 1.02 lakh acres and 68,000 acres, respectively. For other projects, their strength is in single digits.
The O&M cadre position is even worse in the 36 medium irrigation projects, of which about two-thirds having flood gates. The field engineers posted for the projects themselves have been shouldering the responsibility of gates operation with the help of other staff, the sources stated.
However, after identifying the fact that insufficient O&M cadre has been affecting water regulation amounting to even wastage of water some times, the administrators of irrigation department have proposed strengthening of O&M cadre with the addition of another 327 personnel in major irrigation projects. According to sources, a lion’s share of them would be helpers-cum-lascars as their strength is proposed to be added by another 166.
The increase of technical personnel in the O&M cadre would be operators (57), work inspectors (46), electricians (35) and fitters (23).
Among the medium irrigation projects, Komaram Bheem, Vattivagu, Satnala, Gaddennavagu, Yerravagu (P.P. Rao Project), Asifnahar, Musi, Swarna, Kinnerasani, Mathadivagu, Chelamalavagu (NTR Sagar) and several others having flood gates would get operators. Along with other medium projects, they would also get new hands as work inspectors, electricians, fitters and lascars as part of the cadre strengthening.
