Narasimhan clarifies on barricades, denies water reports

ESL Narasimhan, the Governor for Telangana and residuary Andhra Pradesh, was forced to clarify his role in the thorny issues between the states as he found himself caught in the increasingly acerbic verbal exchanges.

In the past fortnight, Raj Bhavan has been issuing clarifications in the form of press releases.

Issues came to a head when Telangana irrigation minister T Harish Rao responded to AP Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu’s claims that the latest Indian state ordered barricades to be put up between the blocks which hurt him and the Telugu people deeply. 

Rao said the barricades were put up during the President’s rule in the state before the new government took office. “It is Mr Naidu who is driving a wedge between the people, not us,” he said.

When Raj Bhavan responded to the statement saying it had no role in the decision, the minister pointed out that GO 426 issued on April 26, contained barricading among other issues.

Secretariat sources said that the relationship between Telangana government and the Governor have been strained since Narasimhan returned the file from Harish Rao over elevation of Assembly secretary T Sadaram’s position.

The Governor was also said to be unhappy over dragging of his office into the issue of releasing 10 tmc water from the Nagarjuna Sagar to four Krishna delta districts in Andhra Pradesh, a major bone of contention between the states.

Initial reports suggested that the Governor had sanctioned release of only 3.6 tmc of water to AP. “Reports that 10 tmc of water permitted by the Governor has been reduced to 3.6 tmc for drinking water needs of four districts is not correct,” the Raj Bhavan release said.

Indeed, the Krishna River Water Management Board did not reverse the order to release 10 TMC water.

After reviewing the position in both Nagarjuna Sagar and Srisailam reservoirs, Board chairman A B Pandya ordered the release of water as agreed in the governor’s meeting.

According to Pandya’s orders on June 24, 6,000 cusecs of water should have been released to Krishna delta for a week. But the AP government informed the Board that the water did not reach the delta area, forcing it on Tuesday to order release of 6,000 cusecs of water per day for a further week to meet the drinking water requirements of the delta villages.