SAKHALI: Goa Monday filed a new additional affidavit before the Mhadei Water Dispute Tribunal in New Delhi exposing Karnataka on the mismanagement of water in the Malaprabha basin.
It may be noted that the Mhadei Water Dispute Tribunal had recently suggested that the chief ministers of Goa, Karnataka and Maharashtra sit together and amicably solve the issue of Mhadei water-sharing between the three states.
During the course of Monday’s hearing, Goa filed a detailed report in the affidavit exposing how Karnataka is mismanaging the water in the Malaprabha basin. Goa has clearly stated how Karnataka has mismanaged water in the Malaprabha basin by promoting water guzzling crops like sugarcane, by increasing the number of industries and by supplying water to PepsiCo and other companies in the area. The affidavit also states that Karnataka has not tapped water from two nullahs of the Malaprabha basin.
The affidavit states that the index map of the Malaprabha project (Vol 33B) shows that there are at least two major tributaries on the right bank of the Malaprabha river – Joul nullah, which borders the command area and joins the Malaprabha river near the village of Konnur, and the Bennehalla nullah, which cuts across the command area and joins the Malaprabha river near the village of Menasagi.
The Joul nullah has a catchment area of 244 sq km, while the Bennehalla nullah has a catchment area of around 5,048 sq km, which is more than twice the entire Mhadei basin catchment area. A proposal to utilise the waters of Bennehalla nullah was prepared by Sudheer Sajjan, who is/was an engineer with the water resources department of the government of Karnataka. In the proposal, Sajjan has estimated the yield of the Benehalla nullah as 10.92 tmc (thousand million cubic) feet on 75 per cent dependability, of which, as per the same proposal, hardly 1.5 tmcft has been put to use, states the affidavit.
It has also been brought to the notice of the Tribunal that Karnataka has mismanaged waters in contravention of the national water policy. As per the national water policy, the basin should be the unit for water management. The Goa affidavit states that the alleged water scarcity in the Malaprabha basin has been artificially created by Karnataka and that it is manmade. It states that the yield in the Malaprabha basin was initially overestimated by Karnataka to obtain more share from the Krishna tribunal.