June 21 will certainly be etched in the history of the irrigation sector of the country in general and Telangana in particular when the Kaleshwaram Lift Irrigation Project (KLIP) comprising three barrages and five pump houses is dedicated to people at Medigadda in Jayashankar-Bhupalapally district on Friday.
Termed bliss of Telangana by the State government and several other sections, the massive project is intended to meet the irrigation needs of nearly three-fourths of Telangana with its head works taken up at a cost of ₹80,500 crore. The head works ready to be functional have many specialities and firsts.
Significant features
Some significant features to the credit of the head works being inaugurated now include use of highest capacity (139 MW) each in Package-8 pump house, biggest surge pool in Package-6 and biggest pump house at Kannepally (Medigadda) with 311-metre length and 58-metre width housing 17 motors of 40 MW capacity each. Of them, 11 would be made functional now for lifting 2 tmc ft a day and the six for lifting the additional one tmc ft in future.
Not only this but storage of water in three barrages – Medigadda, Annaram and Sundilla – would reinvigorate the river course to a stretch of 110 km upstream of Medigadda. Together, the three barrages can hold over 36 tmc ft of water in the river course without any submergence.
A special purpose vehicle floated by the State government has borrowed over ₹31,000 crore from a consortium of banks for execution of the project. According to irrigation officials, about ₹50,000 crore has been spent so far on the project works, including land acquisition and relief and rehabilitation. Over 60% of the total project works divided into seven links and 28 packages have been completed so far.
Along with Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao, his counterparts of Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh Devendra Fadnavis and Y.S. Jaganmohan Reddy and Governors of AP and Telangana and Maharashtra E.S.L. Narasimhan and Ch. Vidyasagar Rao will participate in formally dedicating the project to people.
Mr. Chandrasekhar Rao has involved himself in every stage of the project — the conceptual stage starting with redesigning and continuous monitoring with the help of live video linkage from all main work sites. Seamless discipline exhibited by work agencies, including Megha Engineering and Navayuga, in executing works and dedicated supervision by T. Harish Rao as Irrigation Minister till December last have made the present status of the project possible.
