Yogesh K Porwar & Avanth Kumar Kankariya
A
gitation must put pressure on the State govt: Bommai.
To find a permanent solution to the Cauvery water row, the State government must take the opinion of legal experts, activists,and opposition parties and prepare a distress formula that is acceptable to all.
The same formula must be presented before the Cauvery Water Management Authority and the Supreme Court,said former chief minister Basavaraj Bommai.
Speaking at an agitation organized by the Raitha Hitarakshana Samithi here on Monday,he complimented Sunandamma and Ambujamma for keeping the Cauvery agitation alive in Mandya.
“We are all with you.We are with the whole of Karnataka,especially the people of Bangalore.Why does the Cauvery dispute arise again and again?
Our struggle will be based on when the solution is.The Cauvery River originates and flows the most water in our state.Although there is a small catchment area,the flow of water will be heavy.
Tamilnadu has two monsoons and is not short of water. They release excess water into the sea.While Karnataka has built four dams to impound water, Tamilnadu did not make much effort to save the Cauvery water and only two dams have been built.
The current situation has come from the agreement made with Tamilnadu which has been opposing Tamilnadu while building Kannambadi for centuries.It is our tragedy that the tribunal orders against us”.
He said the officials of CWRC and CWMA officials once read the order of the Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal and said how much land must be irrigated in Tamilnadu and what crops should be grown.
How must Karnataka irrigate land and the quantity of water to be used by the State?The state government should have argued this strongly as Tamilnadu has illegally irrigated an area of four lakh hectares by using about 67 TMC of water.
Why are the state government officials not saying this? He said that until they do not say this, Tamilnadu will ask for the Cauvery water.
I refused to release water
The former CM said in 2012,the Supreme Court had asked to release 12 TMC of water.Siddaramaiah,who was the leader of the opposition at that time,asked him whether he would follow the Supreme Court order or would be letting water.
I was the Irrigation Minister then,and I said that I would follow the Supreme Court order and not release water.I went to Delhi,met our lawyer,and told him before the Supreme Court that the water could not be released.
The advocate said that he could not stand before the Supreme Court without releasing water.I called a former advocate general Udaya Holla and asked him to present all the facts before the court and make a strong presentation of the case.
Following this,the court reduced the quantum of water to be released to Tamilnadu.Fortunately,it rained heavily and the problem was solved”.
Checked leakage
Bommai said when he was Water Resources Minister, the engineers came forward to repair the leakage.But some people scared him that he would lose power if the repairs were done to the dam built by the Maharaja.
As an engineer,he was not willing to simply accept it. So,offered to come and supervise the repair works. Now leakage had been plugged in 18 gates.
He feels satisfied with the little service done to the Kannambadi Dam built by Nalvadi Krishnaraja Wodeyar and Sir M. Visvesvaraya.
Formulate distress formula
He said to find a permanent solution to the Cauvery issue, the state government should sit with its legal experts and decide what the distress formula should be,get the opinion of the opposition parties and the activists, and formulate the hardship formula.The distress formula should be unanimous.
The government should argue strongly in the Supreme Court about the implementation of the Mekedatu scheme.Even if it doesn’t happen immediately,it will benefit the next generation.
The BJP leader said the state government has been stumbling on the Cauvery issue since the beginning. They are pretending in the meetings that they have been able to get orders to release water to Tamilnadu.
If the state government has filed an IA in the Supreme Court before,there will be more opportunity to tell them the actual situation.
If the government had held the ICC meeting first and released water to the farmers’ fields of Karnataka farmers.Now the farmers of the state would not have faced any problem.
The ICC meeting in August led to the release of more water to Tamilnadu.It’s already late.The government should immediately argue about the distress formula.
They are all with the government.They stand by the farmers when the government goes astray.A struggle is needed to warn this government.We will continue to support your struggle. This fight will be successful. Let’s celebrate victory here”, he added.
Former DCM R Ashok,MLA Ravi Subramanya,former MLC Ashwath Narayan,former corporators of BBMP, and others were present in the protest.
