From tribunal to court

Tribunals appointed to resolve protracted inter-state disputes quite often end up escalating the discord. From this viewpoint, the final verdict of the tribunal on the century-old dispute over sharing the Cauvery waters between four riparian states seems no different. After deliberating for nearly 17 years, the tribunal has come up with a verdict that has left most, if not all, of the contesting parties wholly or partially dissatisfied, though Tamil Nadu and Puducherry stand to gain from it. Karnataka, where the river originates, and Kerala, which has three of its tributaries, have been left fuming. The tribunal, after assessing the total annual availability of the waters in the river system at 740 thousand million cubic feet (tmcft), has allocated the lion's share of 417 tmcft to Tamil Nadu (against the state's demand of 562 tmcft), followed by 270 tmcft to Karnataka (against the demand of 465), 30 tmcft to Kerala and 10 tmcft to Puducherry. As such, this marks a major departure from the allocations made in the interim report 15 years ago, when Tamil Nadu's share was put at 205 tmcft, less than half that in the final ruling. This is what has angered the Karnataka farmers, who depend on the Cauvery waters for irrigating their cotton and sugarcane crops in Mandya, Hassan and adjoining areas. This is not only an agriculturally prosperous belt but is also a politically influential region, being inhabited by the Deve Gowda clan. But what takes the sting out of the tribunal's verdict is the avowed move by the governments of Karnataka as well as Kerala to challenge the award by seeking either a review by the tribunal itself, or by knocking at the Supreme Court's doors. As such, the prospects of this award being implemented in its present form are rather bleak.

The genesis of the water sharing problem between Karnataka and Tamil Nadu can be traced to the violation of the historic agreements of 1892 and 1924 between the then governments of Mysore and the Madras Presidency. A significant feature of the 1924 accord was that it put restrictions on the extent of area that could safely be irrigated in the two states by using the Cauvery waters. Unfortunately, both states are guilty of not adhering to these well-conceived limits and have brought substantially larger areas under irrigation than can be fed by the available waters. As a consequence, whenever the water flow in the river system dwindles, due to rainfall paucity or other factors, the two states begin blaming each other for causing water scarcity, leading to law and order problems.

The only positive aspect of the latest development is that it has forced the Centre to consider bringing river waters directly under its jurisdiction by putting this subject on the concurrent list of the Constitution. This newspaper has argued for this repeatedly on several occasions in the past, as this is the only way to settle ongoing inter-state disputes on water sharing. Considering that the country's major rivers flow in more than one state, some being international as well, there is little logic in keeping their waters under the control of the states. No more time should be lost in declaring water as a national asset, and under the Centre's managerial control.