SC to hear Tamil Nadu’s plea against Karnataka over Cauvery water release

The Supreme Court will hear Tamil Nadu’s plea seeking directions to Karnataka to release its due share of Cauvery water. Tamil Nadu claims Karnataka released far less than the CWRC allocation, despite adequate reservoir storage, amid deficient rainfall conditions

New Delhi: The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear on Monday a plea of the Tamil Nadu government seeking directions to the Karnataka government for immediate release of the share of Cauvery water to it. According to the top court’s cause list of August 17, the matter would come up for hearing before a bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta. On August 12, the apex court had said pleas filed in the matter by the Tamil Nadu government and others, including the DMK, would be taken up for hearing on August 17.

Earlier, the Tamil Nadu government had said the state was not getting its due share of Cauvery water in a rain deficient year. The Joseph Vijay led-state government on August 3 approached the apex court seeking directions to the Karnataka government for immediate release of the water.

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The state government, in its plea, claimed that the quantum allocated to it by the Cauvery Water Regulation Committee (CWRC) as well as that released by its neighbour Karnataka was far less.

A CWRC meeting held on July 28 directed Karnataka to release 3,500 cusecs for 15 days starting July 29. However, the quantum of water released at Biligundlu ranged between 158 and 550 cusecs from July 29 to August 2, the state government said.

A press release issued by the Tamil Nadu government said that as of August 3, the combined total storage in the reservoirs in Karnataka — KRS, Kabini, Harangi and Hemavathy — stood at 77.537 TMC and Karnataka would face no difficulty in releasing Tamil Nadu’s due share proportionately. Following rains in the catchment areas in the KRS and Kabini dams in Karnataka recently, the proportionate water to be realised at Biligundlu should be 26.954 TMC, it said.

“Accordingly, the Cauvery Water Management Authority order allocating 4.536 TMC is very less,” the release added. Karnataka has “failed” to share with Tamil Nadu its due share of water and the quantum was 26.954 TMC, the press release said.