Right from the beginning, Telugu Desam Party has been adopting a strange strategy to attack its political rival YSR Congress party.
It first plants a story in its friendly media, particularly Andhra Jyothy, against an alleged controversial decision by the Jagan government and then makes a big fuss over the same.
As part of such a strategy, Andhra Jyothy carried a story over Polavaram major irrigation project which has been in the news following the Central government’s decision to scale down the project cost to just Rs 20,398 crore, as against the approved estimate of Rs 47,748 crore.
The Jagan government has been making its best attempt to convince the Centre for securing approval for the revised estimate as per 2017-18 rates in the wake of increased cost of rehabilitation and resettlement.
However, there was a report in Andhra Jyothy which stated that the Jagan government had compromised on reducing the project cost by agreeing to reduce the height of Polavaram dam from 45.72 metres to 41.15 metres, so that there would be lesser submergence of villages, resulting in massive reduction of R&R cost.
Obviously, Andhra Jyothy’s report was a plant from the TDP, though there was no such proposal from the Jagan government till now.
In fact, YSRC leaders including V Vijay Sai Reddy clarified that there was absolutely no change in the design or capacity of Polavaram dam and that it would be completed by 2022.
As expected, the TDP leaders have started attacking the Jagan government based on Andhra Jyothy report.
Former irrigation minister Devineni Umamaheswara Rao alleged that the Jagan government was planning to reduce the height of Polavaram dam in utter disregard for the long-standing water needs of the five-crore people of the state.
Uma demanded the Government to retain the dam height at 150 ft as per the previous design so that it would be possible for storing 194 TMC water.
A higher-level dam would also help in the grand plan to interlink various rivers in the State in order to augment both irrigation and drinking water to every nook and corner of the State from North Andhra to Rayalaseema.
