Explained: Crisis at Kaleshwaram— why Telangana's massive irrigation project is distressed
India's national safety regulator for large dams has found 'irreparable damage' in the structure of three barrages that are part of the world's biggest multi-stage lift irrigation project.
The Kaleshwaram Lift Irrigation Project (KLIP) on the Godavari river in Telangana's Jayashankar Bhupalpally district across the border from Maharashtra will supply water for irrigation, industrial, and domestic uses over a swath of northern Telangana.
Work on KLIP began in June 2019. In February 2024, four months after an incident of flooding at the biggest of the project barrages, the state government asked the National Dam Safety Authority (NDSA), a statutory body set up under the National Dam Safety Act, 2021, for a thorough inspection.
The government made the NDSA's findings and recommendations public this week.
The mega project
The Kaleshwaram project on the Godavari will be the world's largest multi-stage lift irrigation project. Work began on June 21, 2019, under Telangana's Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) government.
In lift irrigation projects, water does not rely on gravity to flow in canals from higher ground to lower; rather, water is lifted by means of pumps or surge pools to a main delivery chamber at the highest point in the project, from where it is distributed to beneficiary fields.
The project sprawls over approximately 500 km in 13 districts, with a canal network of 1,800 km.
According to the project master plan, of the 240 thousand million cubic feet (TMC) of water, 169 TMC, or more than 70%, is meant for irrigation. Thirty TMC is for the Hyderabad municipal area, 16 TMC for miscellaneous industrial uses, and 10 TMC is meant to provide drinking water to nearby villages.
The vast bulk of this water — 195 TMC — will come from the Medigadda Barrage. Twenty TMC will come from the Sripada Yellampalli project, and another 25 TMC will be groundwater.
Crisis at Medigadda
On October 21, 2023, one of the pillars — No. 20 of block 7 — of the Medigadda Barrage sank, which led to flooding. An NDSA team examined the sunken pillar on October 25, and held an appraisal meeting with L&T, the company executing the project.
On February 13, 2024, the Congress-led Telangana government asked the NDSA to carry out a 'thorough inspection of the design and construction of the three barrages' of the project. The NDSA visited all the three barrages for inspections and study the following month.
On April 29 this year, the state government announced that the NDSA had found a 'lack of proper geo-technical investigations, design deficiencies, construction defects, failure of modelling studies, structural distress, absence of robust quality control, operation and maintenance failures, [and that] dam safety aspects [had been] ignored'.
'The committee report highlighted significant structural distress across the three barrages,' the government said. 'The Medigadda barrage', the report said, 'suffered from severe settlement and cracking of piers in Block-7 with notable tilting'.
Two other barrages, Annaram and Sundilla, too 'exhibited similar patterns of seepage or piping distress'.
Structural fixes needed
According to the Telangana government, the NDSA has asked for 'rehabilitation of the design', and 'a comprehensive assessment of health and safety of the entire barrage'. It has sought 'immediate stabilisation measures to arrest the ongoing distress', 'comprehensive geotechnical studies and advanced geophysical assessments to establish a reliable baseline of the ground conditions and structures for future interventions'.
Also, there should be 'hydraulic design aided by appropriate hydraulic model studies and structural design through appropriate mathematical modelling software'.
In effect, the NDSA has recommended a full suite of actions from structural rehabilitation to strengthening of the barrages.
The political stress
The Kaleshwaram project, a brainchild of former Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao, was the 'crown jewel' of the BRS government that ruled Telangana for almost 10 years after the state was carved out of Andhra Pradesh in 2014.
However, according to Uttam Kumar Reddy, Minister for Irrigation in the government of Revanth Reddy who succeeded KCR as Chief Minister in December 2023, the Kaleshwaram project is the 'biggest man-made disaster since Independence'.
Telangana, he said, is paying Rs 16,000 crore annually in debt repayment and interest for a 'structurally faulty' project. 'The barrages', said Uttam Reddy, 'were originally designed to regulate just 2 TMC of river water but over 10 TMC was stored in each, causing foundational damage and eventual collapse'.
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