TS: Water released from Jurala project

Irrigation department officials on Friday began releasing water from Jurala project to Ramanpadu balancing reservoir to meet the drinking water needs of erstwhile Mahbubnagar district. As on Friday morning, Jurala reservoir has received .415 TMCft of water after Karnataka released water from its upstream dam system on Krishna river. Karnataka had agreed to release 2.5 TMCft of water following a request from Telangana which sought the additional water to meet the drinking water needs of the people in the erstwhile united Mahbubnagar district.

Water was being released from Jurala’s left canal to the downstream Ramanpadu using the water received Karnataka, according to irrigation department officials. The current inflows into Jurala were to the tune of 912 Cusecs, the officials said.

It may be recalled that though Karnataka agreed to release 2.5 TMCft of water to Telangana, the ‘stop-fill-release’ method through which Krishna water was released by Karnataka, has meant that much of the water released by Karnataka simply got soaked up by the dry river bed as it flowed slowly into Telangana. Incidentally, of the total distance of 250 km River Krishna flows from Alamatti dam to Jurala project, 220km of the river’s flow is in Karnataka.

The water was first released from Almatti dam to Narayanpur dam, travelling a distance of 60 km. Water was then released from Narayanpur where the reservoir levels had to be allowed to be built and then water released from its spillway. From Narayanpur, the water travelled a distance of 110km to reach the Gugal barrage and from there, water travelled another 60 km to Girjapur barrage, the last point on the river in Karnataka. However, water was allowed to flow through Girjapur, a small barrage and travelled another 20 km before reaching Jurala in Telangana.

With the water release not having the required ‘driving head’ – a given large amount of water rushing ahead which ensures faster flows and reduces seepage – as a result of slower outflows from upstream dams and barrages on the river before the water reached Jurala, the actual ‘realised’ water as so far been only .415 TMCft. It is estimated that by the time the inflows stop from Girjapur, Jurala may receive just about .5 TMCft of water in all.