Mullaperiyar dam row: Final hearing in SC from July 23

The final hearing on the legal battle between Tamil Nadu and Kerala over the controversial Mullaperiyar dam will be held from July 23 in the Supreme Court.
A five-judge Constitution Bench of justices R M Lodha, H L Dattu, C K Prasad, Madan B Lokur and M Y Eqbal today posted the matter for final day-to-day hearing from July 23.
There has been tension between the two states over the safety of the 119-year-old dam. While Tamil Nadu contends that the dam is safe and its water level has to be raised from 132 feet to 136 feet, Kerala says the structure is weak and it has to be replaced with a new one.

As tension rose between the two states in December 2011, a two-member technical team of apex court-appointed Empowered Committee, headed by the former Chief Justice of India A S Anand, had visited the site and concluded that recent tremors in that region did not have any impact on the dam and that it was safe.
The Committee, set up in February 2010 to look into all aspects of the dam, had submitted its report to the apex court in a sealed cover on April 25, last year.
Earlier, the apex court had directed its registry to digitise the 50,000-odd page report so as to enable it to examine it.

The bench is hearing a suit filed by Tamil Nadu government questioning the law enacted by Kerala in 2006 to restrict the water level in the dam at 136 feet though the Supreme Court had permitted Tamil Nadu to raise the water level up to 142 feet.