On the eve of polling in Telangana there was tension at the Nagarjuna Sagar Dam project, an interstate irrigation project between Telangana and Andhra Pradesh after the latter deployed a large posse of police personnel during the wee hours of the night to take control of half of the project.

There were heated arguments between the police forces belonging to AP and Telangana. However, Congress has accused the BRS of deliberately trying to evoke the Telangana sentiment on the polling day by colluding with YSRCP which is in power in Andhra Pradesh. Chief Electoral Officer Vikas Raj assured that the police will look into the matter. Regarding the comments made by the political leaders, he added that those were being made in a haste.

Komatireddy Venkat Reddy, the Congress candidate from Nalgonda accused the BRS of trying to raise tempers on polling day by evoking ‘Andhra-Telangana’ sentiment.

Congress state president A Revanth Reddy echoed similar thoughts. “Today, a drama is going on at Nagarjuna Sagar. The CEO has to take care of all those things because the government is working under him. If it is not resolved now, then on 9 December our government will be formed. We will find a way through discussion. KCR has never tried to find a solution for the problems of Telangana. You can see his failures. As outgoing chief minister, he has no role and has neither seems interested. He only has interests of his own family in mind.”

Notably, on the intervening night of November 29 and 30, Andhra Pradesh deployed nearly 500 reserved police personnel who then proceeded to remove the barricades and CCTVs installed by the Telangana government.

The AP irrigation authorities fenced their part of half the project with barbed wires in order to control operations of gates 14 to 26.

DSP, Miryalaguda P Venkatgiri rushed to the spot and tried to reason with AP police personnel to remove the fencing but there was no resolution to it.

There are two dams on River Krishna at the border between two states. While Srisailam dam is on the upstream, the Nagarjuna Sagar dam lies on the downstream of the same river. The Nagarjuna Sagar Left canal is under control of Telangana and it is divided in three zones. While Zone 1 belongs to Telangana and Zone 3 to Andhra Pradesh, Zone 2 runs zigzag between the two states. Following orders of the Krishna River Management Board (KRMB), the control of Nagarjuna Sagar Right canal is also with Telangana. However, Andhra Pradesh has always staked its claim over control on half of the project. This is the third time that police personnel of both states were involved in a heated altercation over the dam project.