TDP accuses State of illegally storing Krishna waters

For the past few weeks, several senior leaders of the party have raised the issue and demanded that the Congress government set in motion a process to undo the “injustice” being done to Andhra Pradesh.

The TDP maintained that these bridges were being built in violation of the  Bachawat Awards Tribunal and that these would deprive Andhra Pradesh of its allotted share of 811 tmc ft of Krishna waters.

A TDP team, including a few party MLAs, had toured Raichur, Yadgir and Bellary districts in Karnataka and had found that the bridges were being built illegally. The team also found that a power plant owned by the chief minister’s family near Raichur was illegally diverting water from the river.

The party wanted to know why the chief minister was silent on the issue and if one of the reasons for it was that his family was involved in the illegal diversion of water.  
He said if Karnataka was not stopped from going ahead with these barrages, not a drop of Krishna water would flow into the state. TDP member M V Mysoora Reddy had on Wednesday raised the issue in the Rajya Sabha alleging that Karnataka was tyring to utilise 100 tmc ft of water of the Krishna river without the approval of the Central Water Commission.

He alleged that Karnataka had been constructing several barrages in the guise of bridges across various streams and tributaries of Krishna river to store water. He urged the Centre to stop the works immediately.

Recently, another senior TDP leader and former Andhra Pradesh home minister Kodela Siva Prasad Rao accused Karnataka of using Krishna waters illegally.

 “As a result of over-exploitation of Krishna river water by Karnataka, Kharif cultivation in 35 lakh acres in six districts of Andhra Pradesh has become doubtful,” he said.
He charged the Andhra Pradesh government with failing to protect the interests of its farmers though the Congress is in power at the Centre.

Official sources have confirmed that the Andhra Pradesh government had received reports that Karnataka has been “clandestinely” constructing barrages in the name of road bridges over Malaprabha, Ghataprabha and Bhima tributaries of Krishna river apart from the main river upstream of the existing Alamatti Dam.