A major breakthrough to complete the tunnel works of the Alimineti Madhava Reddy Srisailam Left Bank Canal (SLBC) Project was achieved with the Robbins Tunnel Boring Machine Company in Ohio, the USA agreeing to send the machinery within the next two months for the early completion of the project.
Minister for Roads and Buildings Komatireddy Venkata Reddy, who is on a tour of the United States, met with president and CEO of the company Lok Home in Ohio on Monday and impressed upon him to send the machine to drill the tunnel that would help water flow with gravity and irrigate four lakh acres apart from providing drinking water to Nalgonda and Hyderabad.
After meeting the CEO, the Minister said that the SLBC tunnel works would be completed within two years once the drilling of the tunnel starts. Mr. Reddy said the bills for the work would be cleared within 40 days through the Green Channel as the government was keen to complete the project at the earliest. The permissions for green channel clearance have already been obtained.
Mr. Venkata Reddy said that the boring machine and other spare parts will be brought to Chennai by ship and from there they will be sent to the work area. Robbins is the only company in the world that has the expertise to excavate the tunnel.
The Minister said that once the SLBC tunnel is completed three lakh acres will be irrigated by gravity without the need for any pumping. An additional one lakh acres will be irrigated by pumping through the Brahmanavellamla project which is a part of the Udaya Samudram project in Nalgonda district. It will also provide drinking water to villages in Nalgonda district thus rooting out the danger of fluorosis.
The Minister explained that the project was sanctioned in the combined Andhra Pradesh by the Congress government in 2005. Till Telangana was formed in 2014 the government completed excavation of tunnel-I and lining work of 23.078 Kms. On Tunnel-II excavation of 7.130 Kms and 1.464 Kms of lining work was completed.
The BRS government in the last 10 years added just 2,376 Kms of lining work in Tunnel-II and another 11.292 Kms of lining work in Tunnel-I. Now excavation of Tunnel-I and lining work of 9.650 Kms of lining work is pending while in Tunnel-II lining work of 3.290 Kms is yet to be completed, the Minister explained.
