Karnataka toes Supreme Court line, releases Cauvery water

Tamil Nadu sought 50tmc ft of water from Karnataka through a plea in the Supreme Court on September 2. Noting that the ‘samba’ crops in Tamil Nadu would be adversely affected, and the apex court bench comprising Justices Dipak Misra and U U Lalit directed Karnataka to ensure supply of water to Tamil Nadu. Farmers in the delta districts had said they already faced a wash-out in the kuruvai cultivation and were in dire need of water to sow the samba crop. Even the amount quantified by the apex court over the ten day period is inadequate to meet the needs of samba crop, say delta farmers.

Meanwhile, Karnataka made heavy weather of the release. “Karnataka has started releasing Cauvery water to Tamil Nadu to obey the Supreme Court directive asking the state government to release 15,000 cusec of water per day to Tamil Nadu for ten days,” a state water resources ministry official told reporters. “It is inevitable for Karnataka to comply with the Supreme Court order in the interest of the state,” top government sources said, adding, “constitutionally, it is not possible to defy it”. Reports from Mandya and Mysuru said the state was releasing 10,000 cusecs of water from the Krishna Raja Sagar and another 5,000 cusecs from Kabini reservoir. The release of water from both the reservoirs was confirmed by the officials. This came about, after the all party meeting called by Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Tuesday, in which Karnataka decided to comply. Siddaramaiah said the decision to obey the Supreme Court order was taken with “a heavy heart” even though the state itself faced “severe distress”. 

The Supreme Court would be moved seeking modification of its order to spare 15,000 cusecs of water for 10 days because of the difficulties in implementing it given that the live storage in four reservoirs in the Cauvery basin now was 46.7 tmc ft against their capacity of 104 tmc ft, the government said. Siddaramaiah had also said government would approach the Supreme Court with a modification petition, explaining its difficulties in implementing its order.

Though Karnataka irrigation officials on Sunday informed Central Water Commission at Biligundlu stating that water would be released, they started releasing 10,000 cusec of Cauvery water only on Tuesday night. 

An engineer at Biligundlu told DTNext “We have again received communication from Karnataka officials stating that water was released from Krishna Raja Sagar and the water level is expected to reach Biligundlu gauging station on Wednesday evening,”. 

When asked if water was released on Sunday, the official replied “they informed so”. Meanwhile PWD officials at Mettur dam are gearing up to undertake precautionary measures. “Water will reach Mettur on Thursday morning. Release of water from Mettur will be decided in accordance with the water level,” said R Subramaniyan, Executive Engineer, PWD, Mettur dam.