Banakacherla wants 200 TMC. Telangana says no.

Andhra Pradesh has formally proposed a Polavaram–Banakacherla link to move 200 TMC of Godavari “flood waters” towards the Srisailam Right Main Canal — on paper at 2 TMC a day, 6,563 Mcum a year, and Rs 81,900 crore before you even count building the new ayacut it claims it will serve. That is Andhra Pradesh’s submission to the Union Environment Ministry’s Expert Appraisal Committee (EAC), not a rumour.

The BJP-led Centre’s EAC did not wave it through. It returned the file and told Andhra Pradesh to first establish water availability with the Central Water Commission, address interstate issues including allegations of violating the 1980 Godavari award, and come back with permissions. Returned, not approved — and not exactly a green light for a 376 km canal, twin tunnels through the Nagarjunasagar–Srisailam Tiger Reserve, nine pump houses and two 200 MW hydel units.

Telangana’s stand is on the record. “An uncompromising fight to safeguard the state’s rightful share of water,” Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy said, adding that the “surplus floodwater” line is unacceptable and that objections have gone to Jal Shakti, Finance and Environment. Andhra Pradesh, for its part, is promising 80 lakh people’s drinking water, 3 lakh hectares of new ayacut, 9.14 lakh hectares stabilised, 20 TMC for industry and 400 MW of power — all benefits claimed by the project proponent, none vetted by the bodies that asked them to do their homework first.

Two figures now sit side by side: Andhra Pradesh’s filed plan for 200 TMC, and Telangana’s warning that plans stretch up to 300 TMC. What is settled today is narrower: the proposal exists, the scale is massive, the legal and hydrology questions are live, and the EAC sent it back pending CWC examination and inter-state clearances. If the BJP-led Centre means to referee fairly, it can start by insisting those answers arrive before a single shovel — or tunnel boring machine — moves.