Godavari and Krishna rivers interlink: When two rivers meet

Godavari and Krishna rivers interlink: When two rivers meet The background

* 3,000 TMC of the Godavari’s flood waters flows into the Bay of Bengal every year. Successive Andhra Pradesh governments have been trying to harness at least 10 per cent of this water and divert some of it into the Krishna, whose delta faces an acute shortage of water for irrigation from June to August.

* While the plan is to eventually divert water from the Polavaram dam, since the dam is still under construction and will take at least 4 to 5 years to be ready, the Chandrababu Naidu government decided to divert Godavari water from the Pattiseema Lift Irrigation Scheme. This plan will kick off on September 16. For now, since September 1, the government has been carrying out a trial run, pumping water into the canal from the Tadipudi lift irrigation project of the Godavari. It’s this water that will enter the Krishna delta on September 15.

The Pattiseema plan

Pattiseema is a village in Polavaram mandal of West Godavari district. 80 TMC of flood water from the Godavari at this point will be diverted into the Polavaram Right Main Canal, which is nearly complete up to Prakasam Barrage on river Krishna at Vijayawada, 174 km away.

But this water has to be lifted from the Godavari at Pattiseema and pumped to the Polavaram Right Main Canal, 3.9 km away.

 By next year, 24 vertical turbine pumps of 4,611 HP each will lift and pump the water through 12 rows of pipelines into the Polavaram canal. The flood in Godavari lasts until the last week of November. The 24 pumps will lift 8,500 cusecs of water, harnessing 80 TMC over a period of 108 days or until the Godavari flood lasts, according to V S Ramesh Babu, Chief Engineer, Pattiseema Project

* Rs 1,427 crore is the cost of the Pattiseema project, which was approved on January 1, 2015, and work on which began on February 23.

The gains

* Of the 80 TMC of Godavari water, 10 TMC will be diverted to domestic and industrial users in major towns in Krishna and West Godavari districts. The remaining 70 TMC will be released for irrigation in Krishna and West Godavari districts, enough to irrigate 7 lakh acres of paddy fields

* 80 TMC of Godavari water in the Krishna delta means the pressure to supply water from river Krishna eases and the Krishna water can be saved and stored at Srisailam dam, from where it can be supplied to the drought-prone Rayalaseema region.