Convene CRA meet now: Jaya to PM

Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa has urged Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee to immediately convene the Cauvery River Authority (CRA) meeting to decide the release of Cauvery water to Tamil Nadu as per the interim order of the Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal (CWDT) and the Distress Sharing Formula (DSF).

In a letter to the PM, she pointed out that against 107.64 tmc ft prescribed by CWDT for the period till August 31, the Mettur Dam in Tamil Nadu had received only 17.33 tmc ft, thus leaving a huge deficit of 90.31 tmc ft. Due to poor storage and also because Karnataka did not release water in terms of the CWDT’s orders, Mettur could not be opened for irrigation on June 12 as scheduled this year too. While Kuruvai crops have already failed, farmers are now afraid of losing Samba crops too.

‘‘The farmers and landless agricultural labourers are undergoing untold misery and hardships and this situation should not be allowed to continue any longer,’’ she wrote to the PM.