Tamil Nadu may approach Supreme Court seeking greater powers for Cauvery Water Management Authority

Frustrated that the Cauvery Water Management Authority (CWMA) does not have the power to enforce its orders, Tamil Nadu is contemplating approaching the Supreme Court with a prayer that the Authority be given teeth. It wants the Authority to be modelled along the lines of the Bhakra Beas Management Board (BBMB), a case of which has been mentioned in the Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal’s report (Volume V).

Established in October 1967, the BBMB is engaged in the regulation of the supply of water and electricity from Bhakra Nangal and Beas projects to Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh, Delhi, and Chandigarh. The CWMA chairperson Saumitra Kumar Haldar, too, in an interaction with The Hindu in August, referred to the Tribunal’s recommendation and explained that the Board, with the chief being appointed by the Union government, “owns, operates, manages, and regulates” the projects.

“They [the BBMB] take joint decisions regarding how much water is to be given and what the scheduling will be. Everything is planned,” Mr. Haldar had said. Tamil Nadu has been complaining that despite the quantities of water release stipulated by the CWMA in the last three-odd months being inadequate and lower than the proportionate share, the upper riparian State of Karnataka has not provided water, as per the mandated releases.

Of the seven spells of the 15-day water release ordered by the Authority since July 29, Karnataka has not complied with the release in five spells, even though, cumulatively, Tamil Nadu realised about 5,000 cubic feet per second (cusecs) higher than the total figure of 5.71 lakh cusecs, according to a persual of the data measured at Biligundulu on the inter-State border of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu.

As per the data available with the Central Water Commission, four reservoirs of Karnataka (Krishnaraja Sagara, Kabini, Hemavathi, and Harangi) registered a net cumulative inflow of about 132 thousand million cubic feet (tmc ft) during the period of June 1 to November 4, marking a shortfall of around 54%.

The 30-year-long average net inflow was around 288 tmc ft. If the same shortfall is to be applied in the case of Tamil Nadu, the realisation should have been around 67 tmc ft between June 1 and November 4 against the quantum of approximately 145 tmc ft in a normal year.

But Biligundulu received 53.43 tmc ft only with a shortfall of around 13 tmc ft. The Authority, however, has not asked Karnataka to clear the backlog, which, according to the calculations of Tamil Nadu, comes to nearly 17 tmc ft.

A senior government official says that even when the State had approached the Supreme Court seeking its intervention, the latter’s response had been to tell the former to go to the Authority. But the CWMA’s orders had not been implemented properly.

“Besides, the Authority has not been able to enforce the directions. This is why we are mulling over the option of approaching the Court with this prayer,” the official adds.