The Supreme Court on Wednesday asked the Centre and the Karnataka government to respond on a petition filed by Tamil Nadu against the unilateral approval granted by the Central Water Commission (CWC) to Karnataka to proceed with the preparation of Detailed Project Report (DPR) for the Mekedatu project in violation of the decisions of the tribunal and apex court for equitable apportionment of Cauvery water.

A Bench of Justices A.M. Khanwilkar and Ajay Rastogi also sought their responses on Tamil Nadu’s challenge to the Centre’s decision to give CWC chief S. Masood Husain additional charge as the chairman of the Cauvery Water Management Authority (CWMA).

Contempt action

The court said it would not at present go into the aspect of contempt of court action sought by the Tamil Nadu government against Mr. Husain, Karnataka Water Resources Minister Sivakumar and some others for going ahead with the feasibility report of the proposed Mekedatu Balancing Reservoir-cum-Drinking Water Project in “utter disregard” to the Supreme Court and Cauvery Tribunal decisions to provide ample storage and distribution of water to Tamil Nadu.

Tamil Nadu has filed the contempt petition against N. Mukherjee, Director, Project Appraisal (South) Directorate, CWC; Mallikarjuna B. Gunge, Managing Director, Cauvery Neeravari Nigam Limited; Rakesh Singh, Karnataka Principal Secretary, Water Resources Department; Mr. Husain and Mr. Sivakumar. The contempt petition claimed that the permission to go ahead on the basis of the feasibility report was a “wilful disobedience” of the Supreme Court’s direction on February 16 this year.

Tamil Nadu said the Supreme Court had noted that the existing storages in the Cauvery basin of Karnataka should be taken into account for ensuring water releases to Tamil Nadu during the month of June to January.

“The proposed construction of any new dam by Karnataka through its instrumentalities would alter the adjudication to the distribution of 10 daily/monthly releases to Tamil Nadu. This amounts to interference with the adjudication, which is in contempt of the Supreme Court judgment of February 16, 2018,” the petition said.

Cascading effect

The Supreme Court judgment was in tune with a decision by the tribunal on February 5, 2007.

The petition said the CWC was “duty-bound to honour and implement the decision of the tribunal…”

“The proposed reservoir with a huge storage of 67 TMC would result in impounding the flows in the intermediate catchment below KRS and Kabini reservoirs and Billigundulu, which is located in the common border of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu… the proposed storage would have a cascading effect on the 10 daily and monthly inflows at Billigundulu during the crucial months of June to September… would seriously affect the interest of the people in Tamil Nadu dependent on Cauvery waters,” Tamil Nadu argued.

Conflict of interest

In its second plea, Tamil Nadu alleged that the Centre’s move of appointing Mr. Husain smacks of conflict of interest. Tamil Nadu has explained that Mr. Husain was given additional charge as CWMA chairman in July 2018. In November, the CWC through the Director, Project Appraisal (South) Directorate, who works under the CWC chief, unilaterally accorded permission to the feasibility report for the Mekedatu project.