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Lalita Iyer
Lalita Iyer

WATER DISPUTE

Not just Cauvery, water sharing a provocateur for many states

godavari (File) Godavari river, a point of dispute between Andhra Pradesh and the newly formed Telengana

Water woes are at the centre of problems for many states which share a river, and the lack of mechanism to measure how much water is being drawn by each state, leads to all kinds of problems.

Now that the erstwhile Andhra Pradesh has been divided into Telangana and residual state of Andhra Pradesh, there are simmering problems of water sharing of two rivers including Godavari and Krishna. Incidentally both these rivers emerge from other states, and so a lot of emotions come into play when it comes to river water sharing.

Even as the Cauvery dispute became the news of the day, the issue between the two states of AP and Telegana has been simmering for some time now. While Telengana is thinking of building new projects on the Godavari, AP is opposing it since this would cost the residual state plenty of water. The former alleged that Andhra was resorting to diversion of huge quantity of water from the Pothireddypadu head. Telangana is also demanding a share in the Krishna water as compensation for Andhra Pradesh diverting Godavari water through the Pattiseema lift irrigation scheme.

Since the bickering over the water sharing had been going on for some time, the Supreme Court ordered that both the states discuss the issue with the Apex Council as per the provisions made in the AP Reorganisation Act, 2014. The Union Water Resources Minister Uma Bharti interacted with both the Chief Ministers.

With the chief ministers of both the states in attendance, the meeting was cordial and three issues were agreed upon. The telemetry system will be installed wherever they want for water gauging, so that each state knows the quantity of water in each river and how much is flowing into each state. A joint committee with engineers from both the states and from the Central Water Commission will be constituted to study the availability of water in both the rivers. This report will be sent to the tribunal which will allocate the water to the states in order to allow them to go ahead with their respective projects.

These are a few of the major river disputes:

  1. Cauvery water dispute between Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Kerala and Puducherry.

  2. The Krishna water dispute between Maharashtra, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana

  3. The Tungabhadra water dispute between Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka.

  4. The Aliyar and Bhivani river water dispute between Tamil Nadu and Kerala.

  5. The Godavari river water dispute between Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Orissa and Karnataka.

  6. The Narmada water dispute between Gujarat, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan.

  7. The Mahi river dispute between Gujarat, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh.

  8. The Ravi and Beas river water dispute between Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Jammu and Kashmir and Delhi.

  9. The Satluj-Yamuna Link canal dispute between Punjab, Haryana and Rajasthan.

  10. The Yamuna river water dispute between Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Delhi.

  11. The Karmanasa river water dispute between Uttar Pradesh and Bihar.

     12. The Barak river water dispute between Assam and Manipur

These are some of the tribunals constituted to resolve the water disputes:

  1. The Godavari Water Disputes Tribunal

  2. The Krishna Water Disputes Tribunal

  3. The Narmada Water Disputes Tribunal

  4. The Ravi and Beas Water Disputes Tribunal

  5. The Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal

  6. New Krishna Water Disputes

    (Source: Metro India)

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