In a series of tweets, the Telangana minister called out the Central government for not giving national-project status to Kaleshwaram.
Published Mar 18, 2023 | 12:37 AM ⚊ Updated Mar 18, 2023 | 10:46 AM
Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao inaugurates the Kaleshwaram Lift Irrigation Project in 2019. (Supplied)
Telangana Finance Minister T Harish Rao on Friday, 17 March, slammed the Central government for allegedly misleading the people and Parliament with claims that the state government had not sent proposals for any irrigation project for national status.
In a series of tweets, the Telangana minister took exception to Union Minister of State for Jal Shakti Bishweswar Tudu for his statement in Parliament.
False propaganda by the BJP party’s Union Minister that Telangana Govt has not submitted proposal for National Project status to Kaleshwaram Project.
Hon’ble CM KCR Garu & me as Irrigation Minister made several representations to @PMOIndia and Minister of Water Resources for… pic.twitter.com/qDeee9YLXc
— Harish Rao Thanneeru (@BRSHarish) March 17, 2023
Rao said that on the contrary he — as the irrigation minister in K Chandrashekar Rao’s first stint as chief minister — and KCR himself made several representations to the prime minister and jal shakti minister, but no action followed.
Rao also disputed the claim of the Central minister that the Kaleshwaram Lift Irrigation Scheme (KLIS) had no CWC clearances at a time when the Central regulatory agency had given all the necessary clearances for it.
In this context, the chief minister had urged the Centre to accord national-project status to KLIS, but the Central government paid no attention, he said.
Rao also said that in 2018, when TRS MPs sought to raise the need for national-project status for Kaleshwaram in Parliament, the then jal shakti minister Nitin Gadkari rejected the demand on the grounds that the Centre had decided against giving national-project status to any future project.
The Telangana minister said that the Centre went against its own decision and accorded national-project status to Upper Bhadra in Karnataka and Ken Betwa in Madhya Pradesh, as the states were under the BJP’s rule.
The Centre did hot have any qualms in binning the Telangana proposal, he said, pointing out that this action stood as an eloquent testimony to the Centre’s discrimination against Telangana.
The minister also wanted to know how the Central Water Commission (CWC) could give clearances for the Upper Bhadra project at a time when the case for water allocations from the Krishna river for the riparian states under KWDT-II was being heard by the Supreme Court.
He said that the Centre exhibited unusual haste in clearing the proposals for national-project status in the states where the BJP was in power, but when it came to Telangana, it became indifferent.
The Kaleshwaram project had all the clearances of the CWC, and yet the Centre did not consider it for national-project status, he said.
