Harish Rao asks for pumps; the numbers ask questions
The BRS leader wants Kaleshwaram run continuously, but the current flood flow, pump status and capacity claims remain unverified.
The Kaleshwaram debate continues without a published operating spreadsheet.
Former minister and BRS Legislature Party deputy floor leader T. Harish Rao has asked Irrigation Minister N. Uttam Kumar Reddy to run Kaleshwaram’s pumps continuously and fill its reservoirs. His reported letter, dated September 25, says pumps should run for 24 hours rather than in an “on-off” pattern. The Congress government has not publicly explained why that is not happening.
Harish Rao says floodwater is flowing at Yellampalli, Lower Manair holds only about 11 TMC and filling the reservoirs could benefit five lakh acres. The first claim, the pump status and the acreage estimate are not independently confirmed in the available record. A reservoir database lists Lower Manair at 11.30 TMC, or 46.9% of its 24.07 TMC capacity.
The arithmetic also needs less political mud. Harish Rao’s reported 141-TMC figure does not match the Irrigation Department’s Kaleshwaram project document, which lists 147.71 TMC across 20 reservoirs. The same document gives Konda Pochamma’s capacity as 7 TMC, not 15. The Congress government has not published the operating data needed to settle the argument. It has, however, left Telangana to debate a water project with the spreadsheet missing.