Several ministers & Harish Rao trade barbs over Krishna water share, projects

Hyderabad: Several ministers, including Komatireddy Venakat Reddy, Bhatti Vikramarka, N Uttam Kumar Reddy and BRS member T Harish Rao traded barbs at each other during the discussion on the Krishna waters in the Assembly on Monday.

The ministers interrupted Rao who was giving the party version during the discussion on the resolution not to hand over projects to the Krishna River Management Board.

Rao alleged that the government gave facts which were far from truth. He said it was a victory of people and BRS which made the government come out with a statement that it won’t handover the projects to KRMB. He claimed that the Congress leaders were afraid of the party’s Nalgonda meeting; hence they took the statement route.

Reacting on this, Venkat Reddy maintained that the BRS leaders had no moral right to land in Nalgonda as that party chief K Chandrashekar Rao, Harish Rao and G Jagadish Reddy had deceived people of the district. He said people of Nalgonda will hit KCR with slippers.

Objecting to this, Rao said, they can also give statements like hitting Rahul Gandhi with slippers and wanted the minister to withdraw his comments. He said the party had ‘serious objections’ on the resolution. He recalled KCR clearly saying until water sharing is finalised the question of jurisdiction cannot be decided. However, Irrigation minister Uttam alleged that Rao was misleading the House. He claimed that after so many years, the BRS government had agreed to 50-50 per cent sharing.

Rao questioned whether the ministers were sleeping when the Centre issued the notification on January 27. He said it took 10 days for the ministers to wake up and say they have not handed over the projects. He showed videos of ENC Muralidhar Rao on his laptop.

At this point Deputy CM Bhatti Vikramarka said ENC Muralidhar Rao was a TRS man. He alleged that more than Congress party the ENC followed TRS and caused injustice to Telangana. The agent of BRS party was shown the door; many more such agents will be sacked, he warned.

Rao said if the ENC had lied, the minister should have clarified. Uttam said KCR should apologise to the State for allowing the Rayalaseema Lift Irrigation project and a for accepting for 299 tmcft. To this Rao said they had to accept 299 because the Congress government had agreed to this. Uttam said, “When a new government comes in it should have changed this; but the BRS government looted lakhs which was never seen in independent India.”

While this was going on, Minister Ponnam Prabhakar urged all members to go to New Delhi and meet the Prime Minister and get the projects back. He urged the Opposition parties not to do politics and pass the resolution after discussions. When the BRS members pointed out that KCR had agreed for Godavari waters, Minister Tummala Nageswara Rao said when the State was unable to get 45 tmcft from Polavaram how the government can allow neighbouring State to take water.