Andhranews

Kurnool, Sept. 13: The over enthusiasm of the irrigation officials to rush as much water as possible to the Telugu Ganga canal from the Srisailam reservoir before water levels dwindled, resulted in a breach on Wednesday.

According to sources, water is being released through Pothireddypadu regulator to the Velugodu Balancing Reservoir (VBR) through Telugu Ganga canal. From VBR, the water is being shifted to the Pothuluri Veerabrahmendra Swami reservoir in Kadapa. Though the water supply capacity of the Telugu Ganga canal is only 5,000 cusecs, the canal could not withstand the force of water supply by more than 2,800 cusecs, as the lining works between 0 km and 30 km were not completed so far.

But, due to the pressure exerted by the Congress leaders of Kadapa, the irrigation officials were forced to release more water than the actual resistance capacity. The officials were releasing water between 3,600 cusecs and 3,900 cusecs per day for the past 10 days. The water supply was further increased to 4,200 cusecs from Tuesday evening.
In the absence of proper lining, the Telugu Ganga canal could not resist the force of water and it breached at 0.425 km near Velugodu reservoir. Accor-ding to the irrigation officials it was a major breach.

As a result, the officials stopped supply of water from Velugode reservoir totally and took up works to plug the breach on a war-footing. Efforts are on to plug the breach at least by Thursday evening to restore the water release.

However, an engineer from the irrigation department bemoaned that the political leaders are continuing to exert pressure on them to complete the works as early as possible. The major breach occurred due to the excessive supply of water, he said adding that the political leaders were not heeding their advice to stop exerting pressure to supply water in excess quantity.

Injustice is being meted out to Kurnool district, in a bid to shift the Telugu Gan-ga water to Kadapa and the breach to the Telugu Ganga canal proved the contention right. The non-erection of sluice gates to Velugodu reservoir is resulting in the dwindling of storage capacity in the reservoir.

Dharmavaram, Sept. 13: The Papagni dalam commander Boyakayala Manohar and his wife Velpula Kumari alias Saroja, who is working as Bahuda dalam member, voluntarily surrendered to the Dharmavaram deputy superintendent of police Sivaiah on Wednesday. While Manohar belongs to Sivapuram Kottala village under Kanaganapalli mandal under Dharmavaram police sub-division, his wife belongs to Matli Turpupalli village under Veeraballi mandal of Kadapa district.

Manohar said that he was attracted to the Maoists due to his family problems. He joined the Maoists as dalam member and later promoted as Papagni dalam commander. He also worked for Lankamala dalam for sometime. Manohar is involved in the famine raid at Saikulapalli in Kadapa district, blasting of forest guest house and murder cases of Saikam Basireddy and Veeramallu Naidu, both landlords.

His wife Saroja worked as dalam member in Chitravati dalam for some time and later shifted to Bahuda dalam. As his wife’s health is deteriorating, they have decided to lead a peaceful life by joining the mainstream and voluntarily surrendered to the police. The surrendered Maoists were shifted for interrogation to the Officer on Special Duty amidst police bandobust.

Nizamabad, Sept. 13: Former Maharashtra deputy chief minister and senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Gopinath Munde on Wednesday said that the BJP was extending all support for the cause of separate Telangana State. “I appreciate the Telangana Rashtra Samiti’s fight for Telangana State,” he said.

Mr Munde arrived at Kandakurthi village of Renjal mandal, bordering Maharashtra, along with a delegation to assess flood damage which occurred in various places of Maharashtra. He paid rich tributes to Rashtriya Swayam Sevak founder K.B. Hedgewar, whose ancestors hail from Kandakurthi.

Karimnagar, Sept. 13: The Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) activists held a mock ‘people’s court’ and hanged the effigy of minister for sports M. Satyanarayana Rao at Kothapalli village in this district on Wednesday charging the latter with betraying the cause of separate Telangana.

Karimnagar mandal parishad vice-president Jameeluddin, TRS mandal president Banda Gopal Reddy, TRSV district president Nagendar Singh and others participated in the protest demonstration. The TRS activists are upset with Mr Satyanarayana Rao’s attack on the TRS president.

Enraged over the incident, the Congress activists burnt the effigy of TRS president and and former Union minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao at the bus stand in Kothapalli accusing the latter of using the Telangana sentiment for his narrow political gains. Congress mandal president R. Prabhakar and others took part in the programmme.

Meanwhile, TRS State secretary C. Satyanarayana Reddy said that the TRS MLAs would visit the villages where the agriculture crops went dry in the district on Thursday. A protest will be organised by the TRS at the collectorate on Friday against the “anti-farmer policies” of the government and its “failure” to provide electricity to the farm sector as assured, he said.

Adilabad, Sept. 13: The district review committee meeting held here on Wednesday witnessed heated arguments between zilla parishad (ZP) chairman Ramesh Rathod of the Telugu Desam (TD) and the Congress over relief measures in flood-affected villages in the district. The furore began when Mr Rathod alleged that the State government had failed in taking up relief measures in flood-affected villages and in giving compensation to the damaged standing crops and houses.

Refuting Mr Rathod’s allegations, Congress MLA from Nirmal, A. Indrakaran Reddy alleged that the TD leaders had done nothing during their regime for the welfare and development of people.
Both leaders argued for half-an-hour and indulged in mudslinging against each other as district officials of various departments, including district collector R. Subbarao and joint collector remained mute spectators.

The other Congress MLAs DiwakarRao and Koneru Konappa joined hands with Mr Indrakaran Reddy and all of them attacked Mr Rathod. Social welfare minister and district in-charge minister D. Redya Naik intervened and appealed to all to maintain restraint. Mr Naik reminded them that they were deviating from the agenda and wasting valuable time, instead of discussing problems faced by people. After some time, another Congress MLA criticised Mr Rathod for his allegation against the Congress, resulting in pandemonium again for some time.

The minister asked the collector to complete the distribution of compensation to the damaged houses and damaged standing crops within one week. He said that 19,590 houses were damaged in the floods and standing crops in over 96,000 acres were damaged, affecting 55,111 farmers in the district. Mr Naik informed that the district agriculture department had sent proposals of damage estimation, valued at Rs 7.54 crores, while Rs 6.78 crores had been released so far. The remaining amount would be released soon, he said.

Guntur, Sept. 13: The district police has initiated a drive against video piracy. Superintendent of police B. Sivadhar Reddy has given priority to the issue and called upon the rank and file to combat the menace. During the past one-and-a-half years, ever since video compact disc (VCD) players bacame popular, piracy had increased by leaps and bounds.

With VCD players being available in the market for Rs 3,000, people were taking to largescale piracy and distribution of VCDs.
When the AP Film Chamber of Commerce entered into the fray, the situation has changed. The Film Chamber urged the State government to come out with an order that makes it mandatory for video parlours and cable operators to register their names and other details with the Film Chamber which enables it to take action on those who indulged in piracy.

The Regional Film Chamber in Vijayawada started an Anti-Piracy Cell to monitor CD piracy in the region. Recently, the cell had imposed a penalty of Rs 10 lakhs and a one-year ban on an exhibitor in the region. The award money announced by the Film Chamber for persons who detect CD piracy is also being given to police teams when they bust a piracy racket.

Since working with Anti-Piracy Cell is more ‘lucrative’ to the police officers, they are almost dedicated to the task. Referring to the Anti-Piracy Cell constituted with retired police officers, Mr Sivadhar Reddy directed his subordinates to extend full cooperation to it.

Vijayawada, Sept. 13: The city is being spruced up for the Vijayadasami celebrations beginning from September 23. Keeping in view the previous year’s turnout of the devotees during the festival, the officials have banned the movement of vehicles on the ghat road, particularly on the Moola Nakshatram that falls on September 29. The temple trust board and the officials from the revenue and police departments in the city have decided to keep the ghat road free on the day as more number of devotees are expected to visit the temple on September 29.

The officials have provided lorry stand area at Bhavanipuram, the mini-lorry stand area near municipal corporation office and the Sama Trust land at Vidyadharapuram for the parking of vehicles during the festival season. The city police would provide round-the-clock security at all the three places on all festival days. Even the temple vehicles and those of the Ubhayadaatalu would also be restricted on the Moola Nakshatram day, helping the devotees to use the ghat road.

The vehicular traffic from the Hyderabad side would be diverted via tunnel and Chittinagar, Kedareswarapet, while the national highway traffic would be diverted from Ibrahimpatnam to Nuzvid and Hanuman Junction towards Eluru.

The temple was asked to provide permanent and temporary barricading at the bathing ghats and also on the top of the hill around the temple area to regulate the movement of the devotees.
The revenue, police and the temple officials have asked the APTransco to ensure uninterrupted power supply during the festival days, while the temple would provide illumination at the bathing ghats, ghat road and the road leading to the temple from Radham Centre. The APTranco and the temple officials would make trial runs of the power systems for clearance and modifications if required.

The boat festival would be held on October 2 with the deity being taken in a decorated boat in river Krishna. The officials decided to restrict the number of VIPs and invitees for the boat festival — Teppostavam — as part of the safety measures. The administration nomina-ted fire officers at the Bhavani Islands to monitor the fireworks that would take place during the festival.

Visakhapatnam, Sept. 13: English as a medium of instruction would be taught in the Greater Visakha Municipal Corporation (GVMC)-run primary and upper primary schools as per the wishes of the parents of the children, said collector and special officer of the corporation A.K. Singhal. Talking to this correspondent here on Wednesday, the collector said the decision was taken after a survey was conducted in the schools by a team of revenue officials by interacting with the parents.

“We are living in a democracy and hence we left the choice to the parents. If they demand changes, we cannot help it,” the collector said. The district administration was forced to conduct a survey on the schools where the English is taught as a medium only of instruction following petitions received by several organisations including teachers’ association. A six-member revenue team had interacted with parents in all the 69 schools where English was being taught.

The corporation has 120 primary and upper primary schools in the city. The survey revealed that parents wanted only Telugu medium in 29 schools, only English medium in 14 schools and in the remaining schools they wanted both English and Telugu media.
English as medium of instruction is now being taught up to Class III.

English was introduced three years ago by the then collector and special officer of the corporation Praveen Prakash with an intention to prepare students from backward classes to meet the growing demand for the jobs in the IT sector. A hue and cry was raised by the teachers’ association and a few non-governmental organisations that the English medium in corporation schools posed a threat to the mother tongue.

However, some sections argued that the protection of mother tongue should not be vested with the slum children. Mr Praveen Prakash said the protest was aimed at depriving the children of weaker sections who could not afford hefty fees being charged by the corporate schools.

Vizianagaram, Sept. 13: Ragging victim Ch. Pancha Mukhesh’s father Eswara Rao urged the State government to provide financial assistance to the family by providing employment to Mukhesh as the latter is vexed to continue his studies.

Mukhesh, a junior engineering student of GMR Institute of Technology (GMRIT), Rajam (Srikakulam district) was ragged and sexually abused recently for which four students were arrested. Unable to bear the insult, Mukhesh’s mother Lalitha ended her life when Mukhesh and his father Eswara Rao went to Srikakulam to appear before the National Human Rights Commission.
In the wake of Lalitha’s death, Chief Minister Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy, during his visit to the district on September 10, was learnt to have directed district collector B. Kishore to extend maximum help to Mukhesh.

Following the directions of the Chief Minister, the collector has sent Parvathipuram revenue divisional officer B. Satyanarayana to Salur on Tuesday where Mukhesh was staying and asked him to submit a detailed report.

Mr Satyanarayana found that Mukhesh and his father had not recovered from the shock as yet. “It is unfortunate that the GMRIT has not at all responded to the incident. Many other engineering colleges have come forward to help the victim in all respects. I appeal to the college management to immediately return all certificates of Mukhesh,” Mr Eswara Rao told the RDO, who submitted the report on Wednesday. Meanwhile, an accused in the ragging case — Santosh — who was at large since September 6, surrendered before Rajam sub-judicial magistrate court on Wednesday. The magistrate remanded him for 15 days.