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C. Joseph Vijay, who became the new Chief Minister after the change of power in Tamil Nadu, has faced the first biggest and sensitive political challenge of his tenure. This entire problem is related to the much talked about and controversial ‘Mekedatu Dam Project’ being built on the Kaveri River, which has once again fueled the decades-old water dispute between Karnataka and Tamil Nadu.
This latest controversy deepened when Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar recently announced that his government will soon submit the ‘Revised Detailed Project Report’ (DPR) of the Mekedatu project to the Central Government and will start the construction work after doing the Bhoomi Pujan once it gets the approval. Tamil Nadu government has taken a very aggressive stance on this step of Karnataka.
CM Vijay wrote a letter to Prime Minister Modi, demanding intervention
After this big announcement by the Karnataka government, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Joseph Vijay has written a very sensitive letter directly to Prime Minister Narendra Modi without any delay. Through this letter, CM Vijay has appealed to PM Modi to issue clear instructions to the Union Jal Shakti Ministry and the Central Water Commission (CWC) to immediately and completely reject the revised DPR of Mekedatu Dam sent by the Karnataka Government.
According to reports, Chief Minister Vijay himself is going to visit New Delhi in the coming days, where he will personally meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi and make a strong lobby to stop the project and protect the interests of the farmers of Tamil Nadu.
What is the whole Mekedatu Dam controversy?
There has been a legal and political battle going on between Karnataka and Tamil Nadu for the last several decades over the sharing of Kaveri river water.
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Karnataka’s side: The present Congress government of Karnataka wants to build a huge ‘Balancing Reservoir’ at a cost of about ₹14,000 crore at a place called ‘Mekedatu’ on the Cauvery river near Kanakapura in Ramanagara district. Karnataka argues that with the construction of this dam, the country’s largest IT hub city ‘Bengaluru’ will be able to get additional 4 TMC ($4\text{ TMC}$) of drinking water and will also be able to generate electricity.
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Tamil Nadu protest: The Tamil Nadu government and the farmers there have been strongly opposing this dam since the beginning. They believe that if Karnataka builds this huge reservoir within its borders, it will start controlling the natural flow of Kaveri. This will stop the water supply to the delta districts (agricultural areas) of Tamil Nadu, which will completely destroy the livelihood and crops of lakhs of farmers.
What is the historic decision of the Supreme Court?
The Tamil Nadu government clearly says that this step of Karnataka is a flagrant violation of the final decision of the ‘Cauvery Water Dispute Tribunal’ (CWDT) and the orders of the Supreme Court of the country. It is noteworthy that in the year 2018, the Supreme Court, while giving its historic verdict on the Cauvery water dispute, had clearly said that:
States located in the upper riparian of the Kaveri River (such as Karnataka) cannot build any new dam, reservoir or additional water storage structure on the river without the written consent and permission of the states located in the lower riparian (such as Tamil Nadu, Keralam and Puducherry).
CM Vijay expressed deep concern: “Farmers are worried on the land of Nataraja”
Chief Minister Joseph Vijay expressed his concern on social media platform Citing scientific data in his post, he wrote:
“The Cauvery Basin has already been declared a ‘Deficit Basin’. Whatever water is available with 50 per cent dependency has already been fully allocated among all the respective States. As such, there is no geographical or legal scope left for creating any new and huge storage reservoir on the river. If the Government of Karnataka goes ahead with this, it will amount to direct contempt of court.”
The political temperature has increased between the two states on this sensitive issue, and now all eyes are on the next stand of the central government.
