No room for chauvinism

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Nov 25, 2006

With torrential rain in Kerala, the storage level at the Mullaperiyar dam near Thekkady is close to 140 feet. Some 2914 million cubic feet of water has been released since November 14 but there seems to be no respite for the dam. In consequence, the political temperature has been rising unhealthily in both Kerala and Tamil Nadu — for entirely different reasons. The smaller and windward (with respect to the Southwest monsoon) State where the river flows has apprehensions about the safety of the dam, especially if the water level is allowed to go above 136 feet. The larger, leeward State, which benefits from the dam, is agitated over securing its water requirements. Responding to the safety fears, stoked by a sensationalist media and also hyper-politicisation of the issue, Kerala Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan chose the unconventional route of bringing in Navy divers to check out the dam's safety. In a tit-for-tat move, some constituents of the ruling Democratic Progressive Alliance in Tamil Nadu effected an `economic blockade' of Kerala for two days. With both Chief Ministers crying foul and Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi threatening to pull out of the Mullaperiyar talks scheduled in New Delhi for November 29, the dispute was pushed to the brink before being pulled back by sober political intervention. What is urgently needed is level-headedness on both sides — and a willingness to abandon chauvinist unilateralism as a method of settling a complicated dispute that is eminently capable of being resolved on the basis of objective and disinterested scientific and technical expertise, reasonable negotiation, and conciliation.
Fortunately, it is not Kerala's official or political stand that it will not share the Mullaperiyar waters with Tamil Nadu. There is, after all, a reasonable restrictive clause on drawal. The focus this season, when the storage has been exceptional on account of two successive good monsoons, is on safety. Although the Supreme Court permitted Tamil Nadu to raise the storage level to 142 feet (after experts said this would be safe), it declined to stay the Kerala Act that places a 136 feet limit on the water level. So there is a tenuous, uneasy balance at Mullaperiyar. What Tamil Nadu needs to realise is that the safety fears among the people of the neighbouring State are a fact of life and need to be addressed more effectively than they have been done so far. What Kerala needs to realise is that Tamil Nadu has a major livelihood and development stake in the Mullaperiyar storage level. The additional six feet will mean a 25 per cent increase in storage and consequent benefits to irrigation (specifically in the double-cropped agricultural lands of the Cumbum-Theni-Madurai and further into Ramanathapuram-Sivaganga districts), water supply, and power generation. The two Chief Ministers must sit together, seek the Centre's conciliatory help, and resolve this inter-State dispute amicably. There is no other way.