Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao finally cleared the apprehensions in the minds of the opposition parties and people’s organisations about how the State government intended to provide irrigation to the newly-carved Narayanpet district through Palamuru Rangareddy Lift Irrigation Scheme (PRLIS).
Addressing media persons at Edula reservoir project site in Gopalpet mandal on Thursday, he said that by widening the main canal of PRLIS and by feeding Sangambanda reservoir with Bhima canal and by feeding the PRLIS canal through Sangambanda reservoir, Narayanpet could be irrigated. In order to do this, water needs to be accessed from Priyadarshini Jurala Project, which actually has been going dry during the past couple of years towards Yasangi. This was where he severely criticised the opposition which has been demanding the State government to access Krishna waters from Jurala Project for PRLIS.
 
“I do not understand their lack of understanding basic things, as there is only 6 TMC of usable water in Jurala and combining all the projects on Jurala, including Nettempadu, Koilsagar, Ghattu, Bhima, for drinking water needs and of course to provide irrigation to the command area of Jurala itself, 71.1 TMC are already being used. This is why Jurala has been drying up by summer every year and we have been requesting Karnataka to release some water to Jurala every year,” he pointed out.
“Situation is such that Jurala project itself needs to be filled every year as it is getting totally drained due to these lift irrigation schemes. This is the reason why we have decided to use Srisailam Project as the access point for PRLIS, as there is scope for accessing 200 TMC from there,” he said.
“There is a dire need to fill Jurala Project and we are going to realise it by feeding Jurala with PRLIS, which will assure water not only for its own ayacut during dry seasons, but also has the potential to ensure water for a district like Narayanpet, which has been water-starved.” He opined.