Telangana chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao is planning to allocate unbelievably large sums to the irrigation department in order to show the priority he attached to the irrigation projects.

In a review meeting he held on Saturday, he said he was going to allocate Rs 25,000 crore to the irrigation department. This is equal to 25 per cent of state’s annual budget. An unprecedented share for any sector indeed. One doubts if the state has capacity and capabilities to spend that much of amount in a year. Because, never during the past 10-year Congress period, had so much money been allocated for irrigation department, even though YS Rajasekhar Reddy also had given top priority to Jalayagnam. The highest amount he allocated per year had never crossed Rs 12,000 crore and department failed to spend the whole amount. Now KCR says his top priority is irrigation department and he would allocate only the left over to the other departments.

He asked the official to hire the services of retired engineers if necessary. He also instructed the GENCO to get ready to provide enough electricity commensurate with the speed of the irrigation department and work in coordination with irrigation department which needs power for lift irrigation projects.

He also instructed the officials to complete the Palamuru -Ranga Reddy left irrigation project in two years doing away with the practice of completing the projects in eight -year cycle. He asked all the officials to start work on Pump house, tunnels, reservoir simultaneously and completed them in two years.