Kaleshwaram: Centre points, state must drive
CWC and NDSA told the Telangana High Court that day‑to‑day operating calls on Kaleshwaram sit with the state’s dam‑safety wing and project authority. Translation: Delhi’s agencies will advise; Hyderabad must decide — and live with it.
Central agencies advise; Telangana’s dam-safety wing and project authority hold the operating responsibility.
CWC and the National Dam Safety Authority have informed the Telangana High Court that decisions on operating the Medigadda, Annaram and Sundilla barrages rest with Telangana’s State Dam Safety Organisation (SDSO) and the state’s project authority — not with the central bodies, according to a filed report of their affidavits. They also asked the court to dismiss the petition seeking a fresh inspection and restricted‑use plan. The court has not ruled on that allocation; this is what the agencies told it. (According to the report, petitioner Srirambhatla Sarath Kumar sought inspections of the barrages and the Kannepally and Sundilla pump houses, and an assessment of safe, limited operation.)
This tracks the Dam Safety Act’s split: the SDSO and NDSA inspect, analyse safety and suggest remedial measures — including operational parameters like maximum reservoir level and discharges — while the dam owner and project authority remain responsible for running and maintaining what they built. In other words, oversight is shared; the switch is local. The Act also makes clear that no suggestion absolves the owner of its duties.
On the technical side, NDSA set up a six‑member committee in October 2023 after Medigadda’s piers sank; a CWC document records its mandate and membership and notes Medigadda’s 85 bays and 2019–20 commissioning. The committee’s November 2023 findings — reported from the file — cited shortcomings in planning, design, construction quality and O&M. A second committee reportedly submitted its final report in March 2025; NDSA reviewed matters in March 2026, and a technical oversight panel was formed in June 2026 to advise rehabilitation. Advisory is the word; execution stays with the project authority.
For Telangana, the message is familiar. The BJP‑led Centre’s technical arms will review and recommend, then point back to the state to make the hard operating call — and take the heat for it. Congress can rail from the sidelines; the dam still needs running. Telangana asked for clarity; what it got was Delhi’s paperwork and a reminder that the levers sit in Hyderabad. The last mile, as usual, is the one national parties prefer someone else to walk.