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The Supreme Court has directed Karnataka state government to release 283 cubic metre per second (cumec) of water every day to Tamil Nadu. Hearing the Cauvery row on December 5, the court also asked the Cauvery Monitoring Committee (CMC), headed by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, to meet within two days and decide water sharing between the two states.
It added that the order would continue till CMC files its report. The Court order followed close on the heels of Karnataka Chief Minister Jagadish Shettar meeting his Tamil Nadu counterpart J Jayalalithaa on November 29 in Bengaluru and failed to reach a consensus.
Earlier in September the court had ordered the Karnataka government to release 255 cumec everyday till October 15, along with direction to CMC to conduct field inspections in two states to decide the amount of water Karnataka should release to Tamil Nadu after that.
The genesis of the Cauvery conflict lies in two agreements—one signed in 1892 and another in 1924—between the erstwhile Madras Presidency and the princely state of Mysore. The Madras Presidency was given more water for being a part of the British Empire. After Independence, Karnataka contended that it was not getting its due share of water from the river.
In 2007, the Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal ordered Karnataka to ensure release of 192 thousand million cubic feet or TMC (1 TMC=28.3 billion litres) water annually at the interstate border in a normal year. In the event of distress caused by scanty rainfall in consecutive years, the tribunal said that Cauvery River Authority (CRA), headed by the prime minister, would work out a formula to share the burden of distress among the states. The matter is in the Supreme Court.
Next hearing will take place on December 10.
See also: DTE rewind: Cauvery river dispute