Bharath asks Kurnool Ganesh pandals for half-to-1½-foot clay idols as Tungabhadra and K-C Canal run dry

Industries and Commerce Minister T.G. Bharath Gupta on 5 September 2026 appealed to Ganesh pandal organisers in Kurnool to install only small clay idols for the upcoming Vinayaka Chaturthi because there is insufficient water in the Kurnool-Cuddapah Canal, where idols are immersed every year. He asked for clay idols of half a foot, one foot, or one-and-a-half feet only. Place spelling is Kurnool throughout.

Ganesh festivities in Kurnool are historically second only to Hyderabad in undivided Andhra Pradesh; after bifurcation, Kurnool remains the city where a centralised immersion procession still takes place on a massive scale. The river Tungabhadra and other water bodies passing through the city have almost dried up under the El Niño effect. The Sri Ganesh Mahotsavam Kendra Samithi, Kurnool Municipal Corporation Commissioner Challa Obulesu and irrigation officials met on Saturday to discuss the shortage.

Mr Bharath said there was no possibility of water flowing into the K-C Canal in the coming days unless a miracle brought Tungabhadra inflows. Water to be released into the Handri-Neeva by about 14 September would be used for drinking purposes only. El Niño conditions had been discussed in the State Cabinet; available water would be reserved for drinking; farmers and agriculture remain a priority, but extreme conditions had forced a crop holiday announcement. He said he understood public sentiment, yet circumstances were not favourable for immersing bigger idols. Those who had already bought larger idols could store them safely at a place provided by the Corporation, with a promise to conduct festivities on a grand scale next year.

Separately on the same day, Mr Bharath laid the foundation for city development works worth ₹2.04 crore funded by the National Clean Air Programme. The Culture card is the festival-water collision: faith calendar versus empty immersion canal. The locked facts are the size appeal, the dry Tungabhadra/K-C picture, the Handri-Neeva drinking-only line, the crop-holiday reference, the storage offer, and the ₹2.04 crore NACP foundation. This cutting does not invent a ban gazette, a police circular on idol height, or rainfall numbers beyond the El Niño drought framing in the public record.

Festival water conflicts are becoming a Rayalaseema pattern under El Niño stress. Immersion is not only ritual; it is logistics — procession routes, temporary tanks, and public health after idols dissolve. By asking for half-foot to one-and-a-half-foot clay idols and offering Corporation storage for larger purchases already made, the Minister tried to cool sentiment without promising canal water that irrigation officers say is not coming. Culture desks should keep the ₹2.04 crore National Clean Air Programme foundation as a same-day municipal aside, not as proof that immersion water will arrive. Locked core: small clay idols, dry Tungabhadra and K-C Canal, Handri-Neeva drinking-only from about 14 September, crop holiday reference, storage offer.