Karnataka   

MPs urged to protect State's interests

By Our Special Correspondent

BANGALORE, JUNE 13. A group of writers has urged members of Parliament from the State to collectively fight for the interests of farmers in the Cauvery Basin by opposing Tamil Nadu's demand to release Cauvery waters.

M. Chidananda Murthy, L.S. Seshagiri Rao, Go. Ru. Channabasappa, Vijaya, M. Chandrashekara, Ra. Nam. Chandrashekar, and Indira Heggade of Kannada Geleyara Balaga, Bangalore, have said that the Cauvery waters dispute was included in the Common Minimum Programme (CMP) of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) Government. The State, which had faced three consecutive droughts, was receiving normal rain this year. But MPs from Tamil Nadu had stepped up pressure on the State to release water by meeting the Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh, in New Delhi, last week, they said.

As many as 11 MPs from Tamil Nadu were given berths in the Union Council of Ministers. But not a single MP from the State was given a Cabinet berth. They called upon the people to be prepared to fight in the event of the Centre directing the State to release water to Tamil Nadu.

On the Centre's proposal to declare Tamil as a classical language, the writers said Kannada was as old as Tamil language and literature. The Kannada language was in way no inferior to Tamil. If Tamil were to be declared as a classical language, then it would help Tamil Nadu to get more funds from the Centre. They urged the Union Government to declare Kannada also as a classical language.

Opposing the inclusion of English in the Eighth Schedule to the Constitution, they said regional languages such as Kannada, Telugu, Tamil, and Bengali would suffer under the dominance of English if it became a national language. The Kananda Galeyana Balaga urged the Centre to drop its proposal to give constitutional status to English.

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