Gollapudi Srinivasa Rao
WARANGAL: On a cloudy day, slightly bent over and resting your arms on the railings on historic Ramappa lake tank bund, you look into the enormous waters that seem to extending to horizon. As the cool breeze wafts by, you muse over the placid waters richly pregnant with prosperity that it might give to the humble farmers.
The mist covered range of hillocks and pristine environs certainly wonders the visitors. But, there are more aspects here awe inspiring. The simpletons of Kakatiya kingdom still remain matchless in their acumen even in modern day.
Even in the drought situation, this centuries old tank still caters to the farmers thus sustaining the life around in villages.
“The SRSP which was built in 1970s had accumulated silt and lost 30 per cent of its storage capacity, but the historic Ramappa Lake has not lost its efficacy. It is because of engineering techniques the Kakatiyas adopted,” explains geo-engineering expert and former academic of NIT, Prof M Panduranga Rao.
Mr Rao who presented a paper at the national seminar three decades ago studied deep into the engineering marvels of Kakatiyas.
According to him, the Kakatiyas adopted 75 per cent of dependability and planned the reservoirs to absorb entire flood waters that may come once in four or five years. With that reason, they always built huge tanks more than twice the yield of water in the area around.
The Ramappa lake could store 2,913 mcft while the yield of the basin is only 1120 mcft. So also all other lakes – Laknavaram and Pakhal are twice the capacity of the yield. Even in drought year, the excess flood water available in tank in lean period can take care of requirement of farmers.
Kakatiyas identified ideal topo-graphical saddle for the construction of main bund of tanks. They chose minimum gap between two hillocks to close it by a dam and store huge water.
Mr Rao explains that: “Kakatiyas located sluices at such convenient points which would drain the accumulated silt along with the water. Hence, those old tanks are still intact”.
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