Water down the tension

Even in years when the monsoon dance across south India was at its best, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu used to raise a discordant...

Even in years when the monsoon dance across south India was at its best, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu used to raise a discordant tune over the sharing of water. Now that this year8217;s monsoon has been an abject failure, the water discord has only intensified.

The latest on the water warfront in the south is the move by Karnataka to construct a new reservoir over the Upper Tunga and Tamil Nadu8217;s decision to attend the Cauvery Monitoring Committee meet in New Delhi after months of procrastination. Karnataka8217;s Rs 1,000-crore reservoir move over Upper Tunga will hit the bone-dry Rayalaseema region in the south of AP.

But the already strained ties between the two states may not reach a flashpoint as the Central Water Resources departments have not given their nod on environmental factors. The objection is on the ground that the reservoir would submerge huge tracts of virgin forest land.

Indeed, this is not the first time that AP and Karnataka have been at war over river water sharing. A war of words has been going on for years between the two states over the controversial Almatti project.

While Karnataka proposed to raise the height of the Almatti from 509m to 524 m, AP strongly opposed it on the ground that it would drastically reduce the flow of Krishna waters to the state, Andhra being at the lower end. The issue was ultimately settled with a constitution bench of the Supreme Court pronouncing its judgement in April 2000, under which it allowed Karnataka to raise the height of the dam to 519.6 m and at the same time permitted Andhra to utilise the surplus waters without claiming a right over it.

All this points to the need for a permanent, independent and authoritative mechanism to resolve future water discord between the southern states. Every issue cannot afford to go to court for a decision as political compulsions become harder and water more scarce. AP and Karnataka could take a leaf out of the Cauvery Monitoring Committee experiment.

Though it has travelled only half the street to an amicable settlement, there is a silver lining in the looming cloud of confrontation with Tamil Nadu agreeing to attend the Cauvery Monitoring Committee meeting slated in New Delhi this month. Tamil Nadu8217;s ire over the CMC and the Cauvery River Authority is that these bodies are worth only the paper by which they were constituted. This may well be but things could be different if more powers are given to them to enforce implementation of settlement awards to call a halt to water wars.