Karnataka will get Mahadayi water if BJP wins polls: Shah

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) National President Amit Shah on Monday vowed to get Mahadayi river water to drought-prone districts of Karnataka if his party wins the state assembly election, due in April-May.

"I guarantee the people of Karnataka that we will resolve the Mahadayi water issue with Goa if we win the ensuing assembly election. We will find a solution soon after coming to power in the state," claimed Shah at a presser here, about 630km north of Bengaluru.

Shah, who is on a two-day visit to the erstwhile Hyderabad-Karnataka region since Sunday, asserted that his party would rule the state after the upcoming assembly election.

"The Mahadayi issue would have been resolved if the Siddaramaiah-led Congress government had a pro-active approach to the decade-old inter-state river water dispute with neighbouring Goa and Maharashtra," he asserted.

The Siddaramaiah-led Congress government in the state has "completely failed" in the past five years with respect to law and order and situation, Shah alleged.

"Siddaramaiah has become synonymous with corruption," he reiterated.

Pending the Mahadayi Water Dispute Tribunal ruling, Karnataka has sought 7.6 tmcft (thousand cubic feet) of the river water from Goa to meet the drinking water needs in its four drought-prone districts of Bagalkot, Belagavi, Dharwad and Gadag in the north-west region, about 400-550km from Bengaluru.

The 77-km-long Mahadayi originates at Bhimgad in the Western Ghats in Belagavi district and flows into Goa and joins the Arabian Sea off the west coast.

Though the river flows 29km in Karnataka and 52km in Goa, its catchment area is spread over 2,032 km in the southern state as against 1,580 km in the western state (Goa).

Karnataka plans to build two canals across Kalasa and Banduri tributaries of the river in the state, to divert and supply water to the four districts.

The Tribunal, headed by J.N. Panchal, on July 28, 2016 rejected the state's petition for releasing the water, citing various grounds, including ecological damage the twin canal projects may cause.

--IANS

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