Hyderabad, April 29 -- Telangana Irrigation and Civil Supplies Minister N Uttam Kumar Reddy has held the previous BRS government squarely responsible for the collapse of the Kaleshwaram project, calling it the biggest man-made disaster since Independence and the most expensive engineering failure caused by any state government in India.

He stated that Telangana is currently paying Rs16,000 crore annually in interest and instalments on high-cost loans borrowed during the BRS regime for this "faulty" project, thereby placing an enormous burden on the state's finances and its farmers.

Releasing the final report of the National Dam Safety Authority (NDSA) at the Secretariat on Tuesday, the Minister said the findings confirmed the structural...