Palamoor-RR dist LI project gets nod

MAHBUBNAGAR: In good news for farmers in Telangana, the Palamoor-Rangareddy lift irrigation project got administrative sanction on Monday. The project was a poll promise made by the TRS.
After several changes to the initial design of the project, chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao gave administrative sanction to the Rs 32,500crore project. The project is aimed at supplying irrigation water to 10 lakh acres in Mahbubnagar district besides drinking water to Ranga Reddy district.
The project envisages tapping of 90 tmc of excess water from the Srisailam reservoir to be utilized for irrigation purpose. According to engineers, the river Krishna flows above the danger mark for more than one and half months during monsoon in August and September. As per the detailed plan of the lift irrigation project, the government will draw 90 tmc of water in the two months period at the rate of 1.5 tmc a day and divert it into six reservoirs in Mahbubnagar district by using five pumps.
According to irrigation department officials, the first reservoir will be constructed at Naralapoor village of Kollapur mandal and, from there, it will be diverted to Yadula reservoir at Gopalapet mandal which will be again diverted to Vattem reservoir of Bijinapally mandal and, from there, to Kervena reservoir at Bhoothpur mandal. From here, 21 tmc will be supplied to 3.5 lakh acres, while the remaining 69 tmcs will be diverted to Lokirevu reservoir, Nawabpet mandal.
The water from this reservoir will be utilised to irrigate 3.5 lakh acres. At the final stage, 20 tmc will be supplied, through gravity, to Hyderabad for drinking water purposes and the remaining 24.5 tmc will be diverted to K P Laxmidevipally reservoir in Kondurg mandal to irrigate three lakh acres.
The lift irrigation project will cover 19 assembly constituencies and 62 mandals of three districts - Mahbubnagar, Ranga Reddy and Nalgonda. The biggest beneficiary will be Mahbubnagar district where seven lakh acres will get irrigation water while 2.7 lakh acres in Ranga Reddy and 30,000 acres in Nalgonda will benefit from the project.
District collector T K Sridevi said the chief minister will lay the foundation stone for the project on June 11 at Kervena reservoir. She said the nitty-gritty of land acquisition for the project had been worked out.
She said the project would greatly benefit Mahbubnagar where migration of people to other areas for livelihood was a perennial issue. Once the district gets irrigation water the problem of migration would come down as there would be enough work people, she said.
According to the detailed report, the project would result in submergence of 25,292 acres. The government intends to complete the project in four years.