Hyderabad, April 23 (IANS) The Telangana government will constitute a Cabinet sub-committee to discuss and decide the next course of action on the case relating to alleged irregularities in the Kaleshwaram lift irrigation project.

Irrigation minister N. Uttam Kumar Reddy told media persons after the Cabinet meeting on Thursday that the government has not yet taken a decision on the next step in the case.

He said that it has been nine months since the state government wrote to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to conduct an investigation. “You can draw your conclusion as to why they are not taking any action,” he said.

The minister said Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy and he would personally meet the CBI director.

Uttam Kumar Reddy reiterated that the High Court has not given a clean chit to former Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao (KCR) and former minister T. Harish Rao.

“I can’t understand why BRS leaders are celebrating,” remarked the minister.

He said the High Court made it clear that the P. C. Ghose Commission, constituted to probe the irregularities, was not illegal. He claimed that the High Court dismissed the main plea of KCR and Harish Rao. They had sought orders to declare the Commission illegal and quash its report.

Uttam Kumar Reddy stated that the High Court made it clear that the Commission was not illegal and that its report stands.

Due to some technical issues, the High Court said that action should not be taken against KCR and Harish Rao, he explained.

The minister said in a statement on Wednesday that the High Court raised objections regarding certain determinations made against individuals in the judicial commission’s report, pointing out that notices were not issued to them in the prescribed format.

It granted relief to the petitioners by stating that no action should be taken against them solely based on the judicial commission’s report.

Uttam Kumar Reddy also stated that the High Court verdict is not an obstacle to the CBI inquiry.

A Bench of Chief Justice Aparesh Kumar Singh and Justice G.M. Mohiuddin on Wednesday pronounced the orders on the batch of writ petitions filed separately by KCR, Harish Rao, retired IAS officer and former Chief Secretary S.K. Joshi and serving IAS officer Smitha Sabharwal, challenging the report of the Ghose Commission.

The Kaleshwaram project, said to be the world’s largest multi-stage lift irrigation project, was started by the then BRS government in May 2016. Its main component was inaugurated by the then Chief Minister KCR in 2019.

In March 2024, the Congress government constituted a commission headed by former Supreme Court judge Pinaki Chandra Ghose to probe the alleged irregularities in planning, design, construction, quality control, operation and maintenance of Medigadda, Annaram, and Sundilla Barrages of the Kaleshwaram project.

The commission submitted its report to the Telangana government on July 31, 2025, holding KCR directly and vicariously accountable for irregularities in planning, execution, completion, operation and maintenance of the Kaleshwaram project.

It also indicted Harish Rao, then Chief Secretary Joshi and then Secretary to Chief Minister Smitha Sabharwal.

—IANS

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