The Hindu : Kerala News : Inter-State water talks to resume today

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Nov 27, 2004

Kerala

Kerala

Inter-State water talks to resume today

By Our Special Correspondent

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM, NOV. 26. Tamil Nadu and Kerala are scheduled to resume their talks on the renewal of the Parambikulam-Aliyar Project (PAP) agreement on Saturday.

The Tamil Nadu delegation would comprise the Water Resources Minister, A. Pannerselvam, the Finance Minister, C. Ponnayyan, the Chief Secretary, Lakshmi Pranesh, the Finance Principal Secretary, N. Narayanan, the Public Works Secretary, N.S. Palaniappan, the Chairman of Kaveri Technical Cell, A. Mohanakrishnan, the Water Resources Chief Engineer, M. Deenadayal. The Kerala Water Resources Minister, Thiruvanchoor Radhakrishnan, told The Hindu that the discussions would pick up the threads of the previous one held on November 6. He said that the resumption of talks should be viewed in the context of the success that the State could achieve in the last round.

Two major issues

Kerala had raised two major issues. The first one was with regard to the renewal of the Parambikulam-Aliyar Project Agreement. The agreement had expired 16 years ago, but could not be renewed even though several rounds of discussions had been held in the intervening years. The second issue that Kerala had raised during the previous discussion was in relation to the violations in the PAP agreement.

The Chief Minister, Oommen Chandy, and his Tamil Nadu counterpart, Jayalalithaa, had expressed the desire to settle the PAP row at the earliest. Kerala had contended that Tamil Nadu did not maintain the stipulated water level of 2,663 ft. in February and September in the Sholayar Dam for producing electricity under the PAP agreement. Kerala had also pointed out that Tamil Nadu had constructed the 400 Mw Kadampara dam and a 2.5 Mw mini-hydel project at Thirumurthy. It had also lined the contour canal depriving Kerala of more than 4 tmc of water every year.

Water diversion alleged

It had alleged that Tamil Nadu was pumping water below the Manacadavu weir, the place where water is measured for Kerala, besides diverting floodwaters that would have flowed into the Bharathapuzha River. Kerala also objected to the two saddle spillways constructed by Tamil Nadu at Sholayar as against the one allowed under the PAP agreement.

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