Expectations soar on the eve of Manmohan Singh's visit to State

Expectations soar on the eve of Manmohan Singh's visit to State
The Hindu

HUBLI: Apart from the endorsement of the promise of more aid made by Congress President Sonia Gandhi in the wake of the flood havoc in Karnataka, Tuesday's visit of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has raised a lot of expectations about the long pending problems of Karnataka in general and that of north Karnataka in particular getting sorted out.

Going by the observations made by Chief Minister N. Dharam Singh here on Sunday, Karnataka is expected to broach the issue of early clearance to take up projects for diversion of waters from Kalasa Banduri nala to the Malaprabha.

Project plan

Karnataka's plan had got stuck in view of the Centre keeping in abeyance the "in principle" clearance given by the Union Ministry of Water Resources for execution of the twin projects designed to divert the waters from Kalasa and Banduri nala, tributaries of the west-flowing Mahadayi river, three years ago.

The diversion had been proposed by Karnataka to meet the drinking water requirements, essentially of the farmers on the riverbank and also people in Hubli-Dharwad.

The Centre's action followed the objection raised by Goa, the other riparian State of the Mahadayi basin.

In view of the agitation by the farmers, which had been launched in the command areas of the Malaprabha for the execution of the projects, the Chief Minister had promised to lead an all-party delegation to the Prime Minister last week, which however got postponed.

Mr. Dharam Singh told a meeting in Dharwad on Sunday that the issue could be taken up with the Prime Minister on Tuesday when the latter would be in Belgaum for an aerial survey of the flood havoc caused by the Krishna.

Permission

Karnataka is expected to prevail upon the Prime Minister to rescind the order keeping in abeyance the clearance given and permit it to execute the projects.

Karnataka's case has been that the opportunity of tapping the potential of Mahadayi river, which just flows into the Arabian Sea, should not be lost sight of. Karnataka's case is that going by the geographical distribution of the catchment area, it is entitled to get around 40 tmcft of the total potential of the river estimated at 200 tmcft and what was it seeking to divert was only 7.54 tmcft, which could be adjusted against the share of the State, as and when it is determined.

Karnataka has also pressed for constituting the inter-State water disputes tribunal to adjudicate on the share of the two riparian States, Karnataka and Goa.

The Centre has been dragging its feet on granting the request despite Goa also endorsing the plea for constituting such a tribunal.

A delegation of BJP MPs from Karnataka had only recently met Priya Ranjan Dasmunshi, Union Minister for Water Resources, who had promised to find a "positive" solution to the issue raised by talking it over to the Goa Government and coming out with the news by the end of the month.

Karnataka is also expected to take up with the Prime Minister a flood related issue over the discharge from Maharashtra into the Krishna and Bhima and the pressure being exerted on Karnataka to discharge more water from its dams. Karnataka is concerned over the bogie being raised by Maharashtra that the slow discharge of water from Alamatti and Narayanpur reservoirs, had been responsible for the backwater effect in the upstream areas in that State.

Karnataka's move in discharging the water even without the dam in Alamatti being able to impound its full quota of water up to the height of 519 meters has come for criticism in the State itself.

Besides, the other issues of economic importance to the north Karnataka region, which are likely to figure in the talks between the Chief Minister and the Prime Minister, are the impasse over the environmental clearance for the Rs. 1,000 crore Hubli-Ankola new line project and the slowing down of the broad gauge work between Bijapur and Gadag.