In a first, a statutory institution has raised concerns over possible corruption in Kaleshwaram project, a flagship initiative by KCR.
A "Kaleshwarama ATM displayed at a Congress rally featuring Rahul Gandhi in Telangana on Wednesday, 1 November, 2023. (RahulGandhi/X)
In a shocking revelation, the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG), has indicated a possible undue benefit of ₹2,684 crore going to the contractors of Telangana’s big-ticket Kaleshwaram Project.
The CAG audit report was tabled in the Telangana Assembly on Thursday, 15 February, providing a big setback to the BRS and more political ammunition for the ruling Congress.
This is the first time that a statutory institution has raised concerns over possible corruption in the execution of the project, which is very close to former chief minister K Chandrashekar Rao’s heart.
This, even as the ruling Congress and the Opposition BJP have been claiming for some time that corruption of unimaginable proportions had taken place in its implementation.
The CAG indicts the execution of the Rs.85,651 crore Telangana Kaleshwaram Lift Irrigation Scheme (KLIS).
The project draws water from Godavari with the help of a series of lifts.
Water is drawn from the Godavari at Bhupalpally and then pumped to reservoirs till the water… pic.twitter.com/uTd7velJHm
— South First (@TheSouthfirst) February 15, 2024
The CAG also said the Telangana government exhibited undue haste in awarding 17 works costing ₹25,049 crore even before the approval of the Detailed Project Report (DPR) by the Central Water Commission (CWC) in June 2018. The BRS was in power back then.
In what appeared to be another area of concern, the CAG said that the state inflated the cost of the project by bringing in additional components and an unwarranted increasing the capacity of water drawn from the Godavari river from 2 tmcft per day to 3 tmcft per day, which entailed an additional investment of ₹28,151 crore.
The report said that the scope of the work under 21 contracts, inter alia, involved the supply and installation of lifts with a total capacity of 8,338 MW.
The state’s Department of Irrigation provided ₹17,653 crore towards the cost of the pumps, motors, and auxiliary equipment without assessing the market rates.
The report pointed out that the actual cost at which the contractors procured the equipment from BHEL was ₹7,212 crore, which was higher by ₹5,525 crore as their actual cost was ₹1,686 crore.
Even when 30 percent of the estimated cost was allowed as overheads and contractors’ profit, the possibility of undue benefit of at least ₹2,684 crore to the contractors of these works could not be ruled out, noted the audit report.
The CAG report also said that the Kaleshwaram Project created a new command area of only 40,088 acres as against the targeted command area of 18 lakh acres.
The distributary network for the existing command area of 3.43 lakh acres was yet to be awarded.
The report also pointed out that considering the likely cost of the works yet to be entrusted, land acquisition, rehabilitation, resettlement, and interest during construction, the project was now likely to cost more than ₹1.47 lakh crore as against the cost of ₹81,911 crore projected to the CWC.
The capital cost of the irrigation works out to ₹6.42 lakh per acre.
The lifts under the project would require 8,459 MW of power, which works out to 46.82 percent of the total installed capacity presently available in the state.
The project requires a total of 14,344 million units of energy every year after completion. The peak energy demand, when all the pumps are likely to be operated simultaneously, during pumping season, works out to 203 million units per day.
This is more than the average daily energy availed — 196 million units per day — in the entire state in 2021-22.
Another scary discovery was that the project would require ₹10,374 crore towards energy charges every year.
In addition, there would be an annual operation and maintenance cost of ₹272 crore.
The commitment on the annual operational costs of the project would be ₹10,647 crore per annum, which works out to ₹46,364 per acre.
The report also raised red flags on the construction of the largest reservoir under the project Sri Komaravelli Mallanna Sagar with a huge capacity of 50 tmcft.
A preliminary study by the National Geophysical Research Institute (NGRI) revealed that there was a deep-seated vertical fault in the proposed location of the reservoir.
However, the department went ahead and constructed the reservoir with a total expenditure of ₹6,126 crore without conducting detailed seismic studies.
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