Budget 2018: This is why Maharashtra's drought woes are likely to continue

BUDGET 2018 - In many ways, the Lendi irrigation project close to the Andhra Pradesh-Maharashtra border continues to be a prime example of the excruciating delays that have plagued irrigation projects in India.

Conceived in 1987, this major irrigation project was to be completed in 1992. The project involved building a dam at the Lendi river to store over 6 trillion cubic metres of water before it joined the Manjira river, a tributary of the Godavari, the largest river of peninsular India. The project being executed by the Godavari Marathwada Irrigation Development Corporation Ltd was originally envisaged to be built at the cost of half a billion rupees. But in 2016, authorities further pushed the completion date to 2020 with a revised cost of Rs 14 billion. If the project is completed after 28 years of delay, it will join 16 other such irrigation projects in Maharashtra that have been hanging fire for over two decades. Many of these projects are in the severe drought-hit regions of Vidarbha and Marathwada in the state.
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