PM steps in on Mullapriyar issue

As political parties and voluntary groups in Kerala intensified protests on Mullaperiyar Dam issue, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh stepped in today and met four delegations from Tamil Nadu and Kerala, indicating that a meeting of Chief Ministers of both states would be convened soon to to find an amicable solution.

MPs from Tamil Nadu and Central and state ministers from Kerala sought the Prime Minister's immediate intervention on the issue.

Singh did not give any assurance to representatives from both states, but listened patiently to their views and said he will talk to Union Water Resources Minister Pawan Kumar Bansal on the issue.

"The Prime Minister heard us patiently. We submitted a memorandum to him in this regard. He listened to our views. He said he would talk to Water Resources Minister and ask him to work on a meeting of Chief Ministers of both states," Virudunagar Congress MP Manick Tagore told PTI.

The Congress and DMK delegations from Tamil Nadu, which met Singh separately, accused political parties in Kerala of misleading people on safety of Mullaperiyar Dam and called their actions "false propaganda".

However, the delegations from Kerala said they were for "open talks" with the neighbouring states and that they will not oppose a third party intervention to decide the operations of a new dam, if it is allowed to construct it in the place of existing one.

"If Tamil Nadu has any apprehension over the operation of a new dam... We are willing to leave such matters and rest of other things to a third party-- whether it is Supreme Court or a political establishment like Prime Minister. Let us construct a new dam," Kerala Revenue Minister Thiruvanchoor Radhakrishnan said.

Normal life was disrupted in four vulnerable districts, including Idukki, where the 116-year-old dam is located, as BJP and Kerala Congress(M) separately called for a dawn-to- dusk hartal.