Nagarjna Sagar is a masonry dam on the Krishna River at Nagarjuna Sagar in the border of Guntur and Nalgonda

districts of Telangana State, India. The construction duration of the dam was between the years of 1955 and 1967.

The dam created a water reservoir whose capacity is 11,472 million cubic metres. The dam is 490 ft (150 m). tall and

1.6 km long with 26 gates which are 42 ft (13 m). wide and 45 ft (14 m). tall. Nagarjuna Sagar was the earliest in the

series of large infrastructure projects initiated for the Green Revolution in India; it also is one of the earliest multi-

purpose irrigation and hydro-electric projects in India. The dam provides irrigation water to the Nalgonda, Prakasam,

Khammam, Krishna and Guntur districts along with electric power to the national grid.

The proposal to construct a dam to use the excess waters of the Krishna river was planned by the British Engineers in

1903 on the supervision of Hyderabad Nizams. Since then, various competing sites in Siddeswaram, Hyderabad and

Pulichintala were identified as the most suitable locations for the reservoirs. The perseverance of the Raja of Muktyala

paved way for the site identification, design and construction of the dam. Nagarjunasagar was the earliest in the

series of "modern temples" taken up to usher in the Green Revolution in India.

Project construction was officially inaugurated by Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru on 10 December 1955 and

proceeded for the next twelve years. The reservoir water was released into the left and right bank canals by Prime

Minister Indira Gandhi in 1967. Construction of the hydropower plant followed, with generation increasing between

1978 and 1985, as additional units came into service.

The construction of the dam submerged an ancient Buddhist settlement, Nagarjunakonda, which was the capital of the

Ikshvaku dynasty in the 1st and 2nd centuries, the successors of the Satavahanas in the Eastern Deccan. Excavations

here had yielded 30 Buddhist monasteries, as well as art works and inscriptions of great historical importance. In

advance of the reservoir's flooding, monuments were dug up and relocated. Some were moved to Nagarjuna's Hill, now

an island in the middle of the reservoir. Others were moved to the mainland.