National

Unquiet Flows The Cauvery

The Centre is in a bind as Jayalalitha ups the ante on Cauvery and Karnataka remains resolute

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Unquiet Flows The Cauvery
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THE Cauvery is a swirling torrent this year too, but the bounty may not suffice to quench the thirst of political parties which hanker after power. Unlike other years when the crisis rocked the southern neighbours—Karnataka and Tamil Nadu—mainly due to poor rainfall, this year the crisis has less to do with water and more to do with competitive chauvinism. But that hasn’t prevented the issue from threatening to become a flashpoint between the Vajpayee government and its ‘ally’ in Chennai. And for the BJP, the situation is all the more piquant because it is, quite literally, Hobson’s choice for them.

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Primarily, because the Cauvery issue is about re-sharing of water that’s almost fully utilised. Not surprisingly, the Cauvery waters dispute has engaged the governments of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu from the mid-1950s till 1990 when the dispute was referred to the Cauvery Waters Disputes Tribunal. From then till today has been spent arguing over the decisions of the tribunal.

Last week, in a strongly-worded statement, Jayalalitha accused the BJP of behaving in a partisan manner. She charged it with thinking only about the political future of the 13 BJP MPs from Karnataka and not of the Tamil electorate who had returned 30 MPs for the present government at Delhi. "There will be dire consequences if the Centre fails to notify the interim award by the tribunal," she warned. Though Jayalalitha seemed to give the Centre a deadline of 48 hours, she stopped short of threatening to withdraw support. "We will wait and see what the government does in the apex court on August 12," was her ominous response. This is the final date given by the Supreme Court to the Centre—after 14 hearings—to decide on the dispute.

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In Bangalore, on the other hand, chief minister J.H. Patel is pinning his hopes on a negotiated settlement of the Cauvery dispute. Both Patel and former prime minister H.D. Deve Gowda are hoping to claim credit, and in the process, regain the support base that has been eroded during the last three years. Patel and Gowda despise one another, but would not hesitate to capi-talise on any ‘folly’ on prime minister Vajpayee’s part. In fact, Patel is itching to get his teeth into something substantial with which to attack the BJP and, perhaps more importantly, its ally the Lok Sha-kti, headed by Gowda’s bete noir, Union commerce minister Ramakrishna Hegde.

The expectation in Bang-alore is that if Vajpayee slips up even a fraction, Patel could play on the fact that he had almost negotiated a settlement with M. Karunanidhi last year, while at the same time hauling Vajpayee over the coals for giving in to Jayalalitha’s demands. With elections to the legislative assembly only a year away, the parties are keen to exploit the issue, though for the moment the ruling Janata Dal and the Opposition Congress and BJP are functioning as an uneasy, cohesive block opposing Tamil Nadu’s demands.

For AIADMK leader Jayalalitha, however, the crisis can well mean a way to turn the heat on the BJP which has so far resisted her demand for the dismissal of the DMK government. Says a senior AIADMK leader: "If we withdraw support over the Cauvery issue Amma will be seen as a martyr." For Jayalalitha well knows the emotional drive of the water dispute.

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 In fact, the first protest from Tamil Nadu was lodged in the ’50s when Karnataka began work on the Kabini irrigation and hydel project. Between 1968 and 1970, six rounds of chief minister level talks failed. In February 1970, Tamil Nadu requested the Centre to refer the dispute to a tribunal under the Inter-State Waters Disputes Act of 1956. With the Congress in power in Delhi as well as Bangalore, Mrs Indira Gandhi refused to comply with the request and Tamil Nadu moved the Supreme Court in August 1971.

In 1972, Tamil Nadu withdrew the case, acting on Mrs Gandhi’s assurance that there would be a Central Cauvery Fact Finding Committee (CFFC) and based on the committee’s meeting the Centre would facilitate the resolution of the dispute.

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In November 1974, under the chairmanship of Jagjivan Ram, a meeting was held in which the Union government proposed that Tamil Nadu would get 393 TMC ft of water and Karnataka 239 TMC ft of water. Both parties rejected the proposal and in February 1975 Tamil Nadu renewed its demand to refer the dispute to the tribunal. In all, 21 rounds of talks under the leadership of nine different Union ministers for irrigations were held, all in vain. In 1990, Chief Justice Ranganath Mishra directed the Central government to refer the matter to the tribunal.

On June 2,1990, the Cauvery Waters Disputes Tribunal was set up under the chairmanship of Justice Chittatosh Mookerjee, Chief Justice of Bombay High Court and two more high court judges as members. On June 25, 1991, the tribunal passed its interim order stating that Karnataka should release 205 TMC ft of water a year and according to a monthly stipulated pattern. While Karnataka rejected the interim award, Tamil Nadu has been demanding that the Centre notify the interim award.

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Both the states are aware that Vajpayee can’t take any decisive step to find an ‘amicable solution’ to the Cauvery crisis. It is patently obvious that the BJP does not have the kind of majority in Parliament that can enable it to take a decision without endangering its survival.

THEN there is the fact—which Jayalalitha was quick to seize on—that the BJP-Lok Shakti alliance virtually swept the state in the Lok Sabha polls bagging 16 of the 28 seats and the BJP can ignore Karnataka’s demands, whatever the court ruling, only at its peril. "We are worried despite Jayalalitha’s recent record of upping the ante before agreeing to a climbdown because the issue is an emotive one. And Jayalalitha knows it; she has called for statewide protests and sat on a hungerstrike on the Cauvery issue once. We are hopeful that the prime minister will be able to defuse tempers," said a senior BJP leader in Delhi.

Jayalalitha’s action plan is as unpredictable as ever. But there is a discernable feeling among the AIADMK leadership that by pushing the BJP to the brink, it can teach a lesson to the people who don’t know "how to treat Amma properly". According to AIADMK sources, none of Jayalalitha’s ‘reasonable’ demands has been met so far. "After R. Muthiah and R.K. Kumar quit the cabinet, Vajpayee and Advani never thought of inducting new faces from our party. Today we have just one cabinet minister and one minister of state. If we raise these issues, the BJP plants stories that Amma is unreasonable. Cau-very is the right issue to prove how effective we are and how ineffective Karunanidhi was during the UF regime. He did not raise his voice against then PM Deve Gowda," points out V.R. Neduncheziyan, chairman of the AIADMK presidium.

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The BJP-Lok Shakti combine, which harbours ambitions of capturing power in the state after its runaway victory in the Lok Sabha polls, is treading with caution as the Cauvery issue is equally volatile in Karnataka. The Lok Shakti’s state unit president, Dr Jeevaraj Alva, has sought a national water policy and asked Vajpayee to constitute a committee to draw up this policy. "The interim award is partisan and is based on outdated figures and illogical reasoning. We cannot accept such an order," he said.

On its part, the Karnataka unit of the Congress has backed the state’s stand for a negotiated settlement as well as a permanent solution through a dialogue.

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Chief minister Patel is now in a belligerent mood. "I would have asked her (Jayalalitha) to get out of the coalition if I were in Mr Vajpayee’s place. People are beginning to wonder how long the Vajpayee government will survive," said Patel. And added that he, for one, is keen to participate in a dialogue with chief ministers of the riparian states before August 12, the deadline set by the Supreme Court. In fact, the plan is that Patel and his colleagues will keep the pressure on the Vajpayee government and the Karnataka BJP may not have much choice but to fall in line. Patel is likely to meet with Vajpayee to press for a National Water Policy as well as the plea for a negotiated settlement of the vexed dispute. Besides, the Janata Dal government would also seek a final judgement on the dispute within the framework of a national water policy. On this ground, the Dal government would pass the buck to the BJP government, for the need for a national water policy has been listed in the National Agenda.

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Given the copious rains this year, the Dal government would not find it difficult to implement the interim order on release of 205 TMC ft to Tamil Nadu; the state government has released more than the prescribed quantity, except in the distress year of 1995-96. Tamil Nadu feels that the year of good rains should be used to solve the issue without generating much heat. "It is unfortunate that the AIADMK is using the Cauvery issue for political ends. In Karnataka, all the parties are united and none accuses the other of betraying the people. The statements made by Jayalalitha against the DMK-TMC is objectionable," is the DMK stand.

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However, the Central government has more on its hands than just the reactions of Tamil Nadu and Karnataka politicians. Political circles in Delhi are abuzz with rumours that the ATR on the Jain Commission Report—which obliquely indicts Swamy—would keep Jayalalitha in line as long it wasn’t tabled. And southern MPs from the ruling coalition insist that Jayalalitha won’t pull out "because the monsoons have been good and there is no shortage of water for the farmers and thus no political capital to be had". But it may not be that simple. AIADMK MPs in Delhi are gloating over their leader’s ‘masterstroke’ in raising the Cauvery issue and dismiss the fact that Jayalalitha, by directing her party MPs to support the PM’s choice for Deputy Speaker in the Lok Sabha, is showing signs of affecting another climbdown. "We are fully committed to supporting the BJP government provided, of course, the just demands of the people of Tamil Nadu are not ignored," says a senior AIADMK leader in Delhi. And that, as the BJP knows, can mean anything.

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But the BJP’s worries do not just end there. The party’s leaders are aware of the shift in emphasis of the Laloo Prasad Yadav and Mulayam Singh Yadav duo—backed by nearly the entire non-BJP, non-Congress, Opposition. From convincing the Congress to take the lead in toppling the Vajpayee government the Yadavs seem to be concentrating on attempting to persuade Jayalalitha to pull out so that an alternative government can be installed "before Independence Day".

Which brings it all back to square one, really. With Jayalalitha’s next move on the Cauvery issue set to determine the course of the Vajpayee government once again.

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