State Policy and Irrigational Disparities: A Study of Telangana's Backwardness
Mr. S.Simhadri (Reader, Department of Geography, Osmania University)
Telangana, the semi-arid land of India, is experiencing drought often pushing large numbers of people to the margins of living. Drought visits south Telangana "once in two and half years" (DDFA, p.47). The rainfall of about 70 cm and less in southern Telangana hardly justifies the fact that the region should languish under semi-arid conditions. In fact, the region forms part of the catchment of the perennial rivers Krishna and Godavari. The irrigation policy initiative over the years continuously favored the Delta region leaving a large number of people at the mercy of degraded nature and sub-human living. Thus "Telangana backwardness has essentially political roots: with better administration the considerable water resources could have been more fully tapped for irrigation. Telangana is still mainly a dry farming area, like Rayalaseema, but the reason for this in Telangana is long term failure to harness the potentialities of the area "(Forrester, DB, 1970, P.8).
Irrigation Policy
The irrigation works of British engineers in the construction of Yamuna canals and Ganga canal of northern India proved financially beneficial during the nineteenth century under colonial irrigation policy. Military engineer, Arthur Cotton's, works on the Cauvery Delta system, the Godvari Delta system and the Kristna Delta system fetched good financial returns. Under the 'guarantee system' colonial government was pressurised to hand over irrigation works to private enterprise with a guaranteed return of five per cent on the capital outlay. The works taken up by Madras Irrigation Company on the River Tungabhadra-KC Canal, incurred heavy losses and it had to hand over the incomplete works to the government in 1882. In the year 1879 the Parliament decided to apply the criterion called the "Productivity Test" for major projects to assure the financial returns (CBIP 1965). However, the First Famine Commission of 1880 underlined "the need for direct state initiative in the development of irrigation particularly in the vulnerable areas. It also recommended that irrigation be given priority over other competing fields, such as the railways. The two great famines of 1897-98 and 1899-1900 however, left the government with no alternative but to initiate protective measures against drought and famine over large areas" (Jain 1972: p.62). Further the first Irrigation Commission of India of 1901 in its report submitted in 1903, favored protective irrigation projects in precarious regions in preference to the productivity test. Through the Government of India Act of 1935, irrigation was brought under the local provincial governments, excepting treating irrigation as federal in Inter-State disputes (CBIP, 1965).
