Cauvery row: BJP protests release of water; ‘wait and watch’ approach, says government

Drinking water requirement for Bengaluru is 24 TMC. Mysuru, Mandya, Ramanagar and Chamarajanagar districts need 20 TMC. Current storage in KRS dam is 22 TMC, Kabini 6.5 TMC, Harangi 7 TMC and Hemavathy 20 TMC. “We don’t have water to release to Tamil Nadu. To ensure that crops are not affected we have released water twice. We have already petitioned CWMA twice over the issue,” he said.

Meanwhile, Karnataka BJP staged a protest at Mandya condemning the state government decision to release water to Tamil Nadu. Speaking to reporters in Bengaluru, former CM Basavaraj Bommai said that the state government has failed to convey the problems faced due to scanty rainfall to central agencies. “On one hand they are releasing the water. On the other, they are saying that they will go for a review,” he said.

Due to weak monsoons, rainfall for the month of August is 69 per cent lesser than normal. Karnataka has received 50 mm rainfall against a normal of 164 mm for the first three weeks of the month. Despite scanty rainfall, dams in Northern Karnataka districts have received good inflows – due to heavy rainfall in catchment areas of Krishna and other rivers. In Southern Karnataka, deficit rainfall has resulted in low water levels in KRS and other dams of the Cauvery basin, according to Karnataka State Natural Disaster Monitoring Centre data.