The Chief Minister, Dr Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy, will lay the foundation stone for modernisation of delta at Puligadda village in Avanigadda constituency on June 6. The government has undertaken the works of modernising the canals and drains in Krishna and Guntur districts with an estimated cost of Rs 4,500 crore in which Rs 2,130 crore will be spent in Krishna district. Initially, the works in some packages have been awarded to contractors and works have been going on in some sectors as summer is most ideal for completing canal works.

Kerala will demand more water and control over water regulating structures in its territory at the talks with Tamil Nadu on review of the Parambikulam-Aliyar Project (PAP) agreement to be held here on Friday. Chief Secretaries of the two States will lead the talks supported by seven-member teams consisting of higher officials.

As a result of various persuasions by the Government of Goa, the Government of Maharashtra, has decided to stop the work on the Virdi dam. In the second week of May , 50% of the machinery was shifted from the site. A team of officers visited the site on May 21 and observed that only the protection works for monsoon diversion and pre-monsoon measures was in progress, Government of Maharashtra had envisaged construction of dam on Haltar nullah, from 1 km from the point of entry of the river from Maharashtra into Goa.

The farmers of three mandals of Tirumalayapalem, Khammam Rural and Kusumanchi, who were not getting irrigation water to their fields through the stage two of Sriramsagar Project demanded water from Rajivsagar Lift Irrigation Scheme (RLIS) or from Krishna-Godavari link canal project.

The Mettur Reservoir will open on the scheduled date of June 12 for kuruvai cultivation in the delta districts. With the storage in the reservoir at 64.931 thousand million cubic (tmc) feet, the State will have no problem in opening the dam for irrigation. The current storage is sufficient to meet the irrigation demand for one-and-a-half months. To start with, about 5000 cusecs will be released which will gradually be increased to 15,000 cusecs over a fortnight. Last year, the dam was opened on July 18 as the storage was not comfortable.

With several irrigation projects in the state falling in the moderate seismic zone, the state government will conduct tests to ascertain their structural safety. The Chief Minister, Dr Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy, has already taken a decision on the issue, following the recent earthquake in China, which the scientists attributed to the Three Gorges project.

The Sindh Chamber of Agriculture has observed that the government has taken no action on repeated complaints about the theft of Sindh's share of water by a particular province. It observed that the chamber was left with no option but to meet the prime minister and the Sindh chief minister and the irrigation minister to bring this

Sources Irrigation Department have said that the deficiency of water in the canals of southern Punjab would be soon overcome. The water level in the dams has improved due to rains in northern areas and with the melting of ice on the glaciers. They said that the shortage of water in the sowing season of cotton would be removed within three to four days because now the water level in the dams is satisfactory. The water situation in the canals is better as compared to last month. The situation of water in more than 70 percent areas would soon come to normal.

Following an acute water shortage in the main Rohri Canal, the Irrigation department has chalked out a water rotation programme for judicious distribution of water to the growers, the Executive Engineer, Irrigation, Naseer, Hyderabad Division said this on Sunday.

With water situation in the country improving, Punjab on Wednesday protested the distribution formula calling it "disastrous for cotton crop' in four crucial districts of southern Punjab, which produce over four million bales of cotton. In a letter to the Indus River System Authority (Irsa), the Punjab government said the distribution formula hurt cotton sowing in Dera Ghazi Khan, Rahim Yar Khan, Rajanpur and Muzaffargarh, which produced over four million bales.