Centre rejects T govt plea on Guv powers

• Union Home Ministry holds meeting with Chief Secretaries of both States
• Telangana CS takes up cancellation of PPAs by AP
• Meeting discusses power and water-sharing
• Both States ask Centre to complete allocation of AIS officers at the earliest

New Delhi: Union Home Ministry officials are understood to have turned down the request of the Telangana government to discuss the issue of special powers of the Governor of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh for dealing with the law and order situation in Hyderabad. Union Home Secretary Anil Goswami is said to have told the Telangana Chief Secretary that "Everything is clearly stated in the Reorganisation Act". Goswami had convened the meeting of the Chief Secretaries of both the states to defuse the prevailing tensions between AP and Telangana on contentious issues such as Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs), release of water from Nagarjunasagar to Krishna delta and river water disputes. Some of the senior officials of Union Home Ministry, Ministry of Water Resources, Ministry of Energy, and Ministry of Personnel and Training also took part in the meeting.

On the power-sharing issue, the Telangana Chief Secretary raised the issue of power plants to be set up in the new State. Besides, the issue of cancellation of existing Power Purchase Agreements by Andhra Pradesh was also raised.

It is learnt that both the Chief Secretaries, Rajiv Sharma of Telangana and IYR Krishna Rao of Andhra Pradesh, expressed unanimity on the issue of allotment of All India Service (AIS) officers between the two States. Both of them asked the Centre to complete the allotment of AIS officers between the two States at the earliest. They told the Centre that the inordinate delay in bifurcating IAS and IPS officers between the two States was hampering the administration of the governments. According to sources, Rajiv Sharma requested the Centre to constitute a fresh Krishna Water Disputes Tribunal to give representation to the T-State in it. He also urged the Union government to reallocate river water shares among Maharashtra, Karnataka, AP and Telangana so as to give due share to the new State.

The Krishna Water Tribunal Award had fixed the share of undivided Andhra Pradesh at 1005 tmc feet water. Following the creation of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, there is a need for revisiting the Krishna Water Award, the Home Ministry was told. The Act also provided for the setting up of the Krishna River Management Board and the Godavari River Management Board for the planning and approval of proposals for construction of new projects, if any, based on Godavari or Krishna river water, after getting the proposal appraised and recommended by the River Management Boards and by the Central Water Commission, wherever required.

Similarly, the Polavaram Development Authority has not yet been constituted, which has been mandated in the Andhra Pradesh Reorganization Act, 2014.

The AP Chief Secretary is learnt to have had a separate meeting with Anil Goswami later in the evening. However, what transpired at the meeting is not known.