Hyderabad: The Nagarjuna Sagar Project has been receiving a significant influx of water, adding approximately 30 to 32 TMCs daily for the past week. This surge in flood flow in the Krishna River is expected to fill the project to its brim within the next 24 hours. Consequently, the project gates are set to be opened on Monday to discharge the excess water, benefiting the critically low water levels at the Pulichintala project.
Project authorities have already released water from the Nagarjuna Sagar Project into its Left and Right Canals, providing much-needed irrigation support to areas in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh. On Friday, drinking water sources in Nalgonda, Suryapet, and Khammam districts were prioritized and filled with water released to the NSP Left Canal.
The release of water has brought a flurry of activity to the left canal ayacut, which spans over 6.5 lakh acres in Telangana and the Nuzvid area in Krishna district of Andhra Pradesh. Farmers in zones I and II, covering 2.5 lakh acres and 2 lakh acres respectively, celebrated the release of water after a prolonged gap. Many farmers are now ready to commence paddy transplantation.
Last year, farmers in the Left Canal command area had to forgo both Kharif and Rabi seasons due to a crop holiday declared by the government, caused by deficient rainfall and poor inflows into the Nagarjuna Sagar dam. The inflows to both Nagarjuna Sagar and the Srisailam project were the lowest in the last 40 years.
Currently, the Nagarjuna Sagar project storage has reached 280 TMC. On Sunday alone, flood flows added 32 TMC to the live storage. By Monday evening, it is expected to reach the full reservoir level (FRL) of 590 feet, with a gross storage capacity of 312 TMC. Officials have confirmed that the flood gates will be opened to facilitate the discharges.
The flood in the Krishna River has also filled four major projects to their capacity: Almatti, Narayanpur, Jurala, and Srisailam. The Srisailam project is discharging 4,63,981 cusecs, while the outflow from the Jurala project is 2,79,341 cusecs. Upstream, the Almatti and Narayanpur dams in Karnataka are releasing outflows in the range of 2.5 lakh cusecs and 2.2 lakh cusecs, respectively.
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