Repair of Barrage Will Be Costly and Time Consuming, Say Experts

HYDERABAD: Contrary to claims that the sinking of a section of the ‘Lakshmi’ barrage at Medigadda is something that can be dealt with without too much of trouble, it appears that the Telangana irrigation department, and L&T Construction — which built the barrage and according to officials which will take up rectification work at its cost — the task of refurbishing the hobbled barrage would be much tougher than being made out to be. Even as getting to the bottom of the problem by digging down to the foundation of Block 7 of the barrage is expected to take much longer than the wishy-washy predictions that it could be done sometime next month, sources said that the affected piers of the sunken barrage block will have to be removed and rebuilt. The information about the Medigadda barrage and the construction work it did, as posted by the company on its website, however provides an indication on the magnitude of the task on its hands. For instance when Sripada Yellampalli dam and reservoir was built, the Geological Survey of India, and NGRI conducted studies and to the best of available information at this point of time, no such work was done either for Medigadda, or the barrages at Annaram and Sundilla,” an expert on the subject said.