Hyderabad: Former minister T Harish Rao on Friday alleged that the Congress govt in Telangana is helping the neighbouring Andhra Pradesh govt by allowing the Polavaram-Nallamala link canal project.He said the Telangana govt attended the inter-state meeting convened by the Central Water Commission (CWC) to help the AP govt clear the project. He termed it a conspiracy to take Telangana’s water to AP, and sign a death warrant for Telangana. Addressing a press conference at Telangana Bhavan on Friday, Harish also questioned deputy Telangana irrigation advisor Aditya Nath Das, on behalf of the Telangana govt, who worked in AP earlier. He said earlier chief minister A Revanth Reddy attended the Jal Shakti ministers apex council meeting, but nothing was achieved.“The govt’s conspiracy pattern is clear. First, it shows reluctance to attend the meeting, and later it attends it. On the agenda of the meeting, it says it was not on Banakacherla, but it was the only agenda of the inter-state meeting. The govt says it won’t sign and will sign soon,” the BRS leader said.Friday’s meeting was to divert 200 TMCFT water to AP illegally, and the Telangana govt sent engineers to attend the meeting. He said when the BRS raised the issue of the Banakacherla and Nallamala Sagar project a couple of months ago, the state govt issued backdated letters to the media and tried to wash its hands of.“The govt also said it would attend the Delhi meeting only if two conditions were accepted. First, the DPR and Central approvals for Nallamala Sagar must be stopped immediately, and the AP govt must give written assurance that the pre-feasibility report process will be halted. Did the Centre give this assurance? Did Andhra Pradesh give this assurance? Why did the state govt send officers to attend the meeting without any assurance?” he asked.He said when the BRS was in power, the then chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao secured Central approvals for 400 TMC of Godavari water, and 10 DPRs were submitted, with approvals obtained for seven major projects. In the last two years, not a single DPR was sent, not a single approval was secured, and not even partial approvals received earlier were withdrawn instead of being completed, Harish said.
