Telangana CM, legislators to visit Medigadda barrage on Tuesday

Hyderabad, Feb 12 (IANS) Telangana Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy, ministers and legislators will visit Medigadda barrage, a part of Kaleshwaram lift irrigation project, on Tuesday.  

The Chief Minister, Deputy Chief Minister Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka, ministers, MLAs and MLCs will leave in buses for Medigadda from the Assembly. 

Reddy has invited legislators of all parties for the visit but opposition BRS and BJP have decided not to join.

A few piers of Medigadda barrage sank a few months ago, prompting the National Dam Safety Authority to send a fact-finding team. 

The incident had triggered a major row before Assembly elections with then opposition Congress making allegations of large-scale corruption in the project. 

Top Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, along with Revanth Reddy, had also visited Medigadda barrage on November 2. 

Kaleshwaram had also become a key issue against the BRS government in the November 30 Assembly elections, which the Congress had won. After coming to power, the Congress announced a judicial probe into the sinking of the piers of Medigadda. 

The delegation of public representatives led by the Chief Minister will visit Medigadda for two hours. They will also see a powerpoint presentation 

On December 29, five state ministers, led by Irrigation Minister N. Uttam Kumar Reddy, visited Medigadda barrage. He had said that though the pier sank on October 21, then Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao or the Irrigation Minister neither reviewed the damage nor made a statement. He claimed that Annaram barrage has also developed cracks and sand erosion was noticed in the third barrage Sundilla. 

He mentioned that the entire project was dependent on these three projects. 

Last week, Chief Minister Revanth Reddy had invited Opposition leader and former CM Chandrasekhar Rao to join the official visit to the Medigadda barrage. He had also invited KCR to participate in the debate on irrigation projects in the Assembly.

However, the BRS chief did not turn up. He is also yet to attend the Assembly since BRS lost power to Congress. 

Revanth Reddy took strong exception to KCR remaining absent during debate on a key subject. He called the Opposition leader’s continued absence from Assembly an insult to Telangana society. 

KCR is likely to attend a public meeting in Nalgonda on Tuesday. The BRS is holding the meeting to protest handing over of projects on Krishna river by the Congress government to Krishna River Management Board (KRMB). 

The Congress, however, denied the allegation. The Assembly on Monday passed a resolution making it clear that Telangana is not ready for unconditional handover of common projects on Krishna to KRMB. 

--IANS 

ms/vd