Amid Revanth vs KCR over Kaleshwaram row, why Survey gives a shot in arm to BRS
While a probe panel held BRS chief responsible for “irregularities” in the mega irrigation project, the 2025-26 Economic Survey states that it helped increase Telangana’s cultivable land by 70%
KCR, the BRS supremo and ex-CM, was called to depose before the P C Ghose Commission, which probed alleged irregularities in the Kaleshwaram project. The Commission’s report held KCR responsible for various irregularities in the execution of the project. The Economic Survey for 2025-26, tabled in Parliament by Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman Thursday, reported a significant increase in cultivated area in Telangana since 2014.
According to the survey, Telangana’s cultivable land increased by 70% in the last decade because of major irrigation projects, including the Kaleshwaram Lift Irrigation Project and Mission Kakatiya, which were launched by the previous Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS)-led government, led by K Chandrashekar Rao or KCR, during 2014-2023.
“In Telangana, the cultivated area, which stood at 1.31 crore acres in 2014, increased to 2.2 crore acres by 2023-24 due to major flagship projects, such as the Kaleshwaram lift irrigation project and Mission Kakatiya (tank rejuvenation). Therefore, access to irrigation facilities, aligning crops with natural resource endowments and using climate-resilient high-yielding variety seeds, among other interventions, are imperative for improving yields,” the survey said.
The survey report has come as a big relief for the BRS, which has been in the dock over the Kaleshwaram project’s collapsed barrages for the last few years. The National Dam Safety Authority (NDSA), a statutory body set up under the National Dam Safety Act, 2021, had found “irreparable damage” in the structure of three barrages that are part of the world’s biggest multi-stage lift irrigation project.
Kaleshwaram Lift Irrigation Project, located on the Godavari river in Telangana’s Jayashankar Bhupalpally district across the border from Maharashtra, is meant to supply water for irrigation, industrial, and domestic uses over a large swathe of northern Telangana. The project sprawls across nearly 500 km in 13 districts, with a canal network of 1,800 km.
Though work on the Kaleshwaram project was completed in June 2019, in February 2024, four months after an incident of flooding at the biggest of the project’s barrages, the state government asked the NDSA for a thorough inspection.
The current A Revanth Reddy-led Congress government, which assume office in late 2023, made the NDSA’s findings and recommendations public, saying that the NDSA found a “lack of proper geo-technical investigations, design deficiencies, construction defects, failure of modelling studies, structural distress, absence of robust quality control, operation and maintenance failures, (and that) dam safety aspects (had been) ignored”.
“The committee report highlighted significant structural distress across the three barrages,” the Revanth Reddy government said. “The Medigadda barrage,” the NDSA report stated, “suffered from severe settlement and cracking of piers in Block-7 with notable tilting”. Two other barrages, Annaram and Sundilla, too “exhibited similar patterns of seepage or piping distress”.
KCR, the BRS supremo and ex-CM, was called to depose before the P C Ghose Commission, which probed alleged irregularities in the Kaleshwaram project. The Commission’s report held KCR responsible for various irregularities in the execution of the project. The panel also found fault with the former state irrigation minister T Harish Rao, former state finance minister Eatala Rajender, ex-chief secretary S K Joshi, then finance secretary K Ramakrishna Rao and IAS officer Smita Sabharwal.
Following the Commission’s findings, the BRS had slammed the state government, calling it “politically motivated”. At the time, KCR’s son and BRS working president K T Rama Rao or KTR had said the Congress “suppressed” the Opposition’s voice against the Commission report in the Assembly. Even Eatala Rajendra, a former BRS leader who joined the BJP in 2021, said the state government’s investigation into Kaleshwaram had been “flawed”.
After the Economic Survey was tabled in Parliament, BRS leaders, including Harish Rao, said on X that the report made it clear that the BRS had initiated the “best possible development” in the irrigation sector.
KTR stated: “The Economic Survey 2025-26 has put it on record: The Telangana ‘Decade of Transformation’ under BRS rule stands out as one of India’s most successful state-led development stories. Under the leadership of former CM Sri K Chandrashekar Rao, Telangana converted the vision of Water, Funds, and Employment into measurable outcomes. From a neglected region at statehood, Telangana emerged as the food bowl of India, creating new records in foodgrains production through expanded irrigation and tank rejuvenation.”
The Economic Survey’s acknowledgement of the Kaleshwaram project has boosted KCR. After the Revanth Reddy dispensation came to power, KCR has been reeling under multiple cases, including the Kaleshwaram probe, with the Congress keeping the heat on the BRS on various fronts.
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