NTR Jalasayam

Drinking water crisis is a chronic phenomenon in the district in all seasons. The people here used to buy water to meet their needs (at Re 1 per Bindae). The municipal administration remained a mute spectator to this problem admitting its incompetence to supply safe drinking water to the people.
To mitigate the problem, it hired 72 tankers to supply drinking water even in rainy season, which reflects the acute drinking water problem in the town can I foget the days in Kondamitta , we used to wake up at 12 in the mid night to collect water from the tankers you know one thing!, we used to use same water from kalavagunta for all our needs when I was in my third standard now after a long gap of 15 years the water will be back with a bang to the then TDP government for initiating a good project.

NTR Jalasayam
It was around in 1995/6 then Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu had laid foundation stone for the N T R Jalasayam Drinking Water scheme the project was kicked off with an estimated cost of 56 crores , it faced a rugged sailing due to poor allocation of funds.At this juncture present MP of Chittoor, then TTD Trust Board member and chairman of Srinivasa Trust D K Adikesavulu came forward with certain constructive proposals and supplying of Telugu Ganga water to the town.
Talking to to a news paper, Adikesavulu said that he had proposed supply of the Telugu Ganga water directly from Tirupati to N T R Jala-sayam and pump the water to meet the drinking water needs of the town. He made it clear that Srinivasa Trust would share some expenditure for the completion of the scheme.

Rain that brought Cheers to the town
The Reservoir was constructed with Rs 65 crore to meet the drinking water needs of the Chittoor town and surrounding areas. Its capacity is 109.17 mft.Inspite of the completion of the dam construction, it wear a deserted look for several months due to shortage of rainfall .But the year 2005 will be a memorable one for the people to the town.The heavy rains in western mandals of the district- Madanapalle, Ramasamudram, Punganoor, Peddamandyam, Palamaner and Chowadepalle,Chittoor,Penimur etc ., several minor irrigation tanks are filled and the canals, streamlets in the region are overflowing the water.The water level slowly accumulated and on one fine day it scaled 80.5 feet forcing the officials to release 10 mft of water by lifting the three crest gates.
The news spread all over around, people gathered shedding tears watching the water flowing.WOW,that is the power of water.

Telugu Ganga water from Kalyani dam
The present Government has given nod for the construction of a project to bring Telugu Ganga water from Kalyani dam to NTR jalasayam near Kalavagunta in order to solve the chronic drinking water scarcity in Chittoor town.The project envisages constructing of 82-km pipeline and pump houses and electric motors at an expenditure of Rs.80.67 crores. A pump house on the Telugu Ganga canal at Mangalam and another at Alipiri and an intake well in Kalyani dam would be constructed in order to pump water into the reservoir. A pipe line would be laid from Kalyani dam, besides constructing pump houses at Chandragiri, Mungilpattu, Bodagutta vari palli, Nendragunta, Rangampeta cross, Puthalapattu, M. Bandapalli and Muthireval and water would be brought to NTR jalasayam while simultaneously supplying drinking water to the villages enroute. The project ensures supply of drinking water to 420 villages covering 70 panchayats in Chandragiri, Pakala, Puthalapattu and Penumur mandals besides supplying water to Chittoor town.It is estimated that the maintenance expenditure would be 10.25 crores of which Rs.7.50 crores would be met by Chittoor Municipality and Rs.2.75 crores by the panchayats.

Note : Some information has been collected from THE HINDU
The photos are added on 30/04/2006

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