Last hearing for Krishna water-sharing issue decided
The Supreme Court fixed 15 October for final hearing on the Telangana plea for the division of Krishna river water with Maharashtra, Karnataka, and Andhra Pradesh. Telangana has asked that it be treated as a separate entity from AP in the distribution issue amongst the stakeholder states. Justices Dipak Misra and Prafulla C Pant said the case will be cleared on an urgent basis.
The Krishna water dispute has been around since colonial times with a 1892 agreement between Madras Presidency and Mysore Princely State. Another agreement followed in 1933 between the Hyderabad Princely State and Madras Presidency for water sharing. However, a tribunal was set up by central government in 1969 on the request of Maharastra, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka to "resolve the disputes among the states".
On 30 December 2010, the Krishna Water Dispute Tribunal allotted 1001 TMC feet of water of the Krishna river to Andhra Pradesh, 911 to Karnataka and 666 to Maharashtra. The KDWT-II Tribunal which had been set up in 2004 for the division of Krishna water between the 3 states also upheld the raising the level of Almatti Dam in Karnataka.
On 1 June 2015, the 29th state of Telangana was born and with it a fresh row over the sharing of river Krishna's water errupted.
The Government of Telangana wrote a letter to the Union Government seeking a water disputes tribunal to be constituted under Section 4 (1) of the Inter-State River Disputes Act. It contended that a fresh settlement was needed as interests of Telangana had been ignored in the Krishna Water Disputes Tribunal- I and II. This was because the state had not been represented then.
Telangana asked Andhra Pradesh to release water for its second crop which needed water from the Nagarjuna Sagar ayacut reservoir. Telangana said it had used only 117 TMC ft of its 229 TMC share and wanted the rest to be released. However, the move was resisted by AP saying that Telangana had "no right to transfer the unutilised allocation" from one season to another.
The Telangana Telugu Desam Party alleged that bridge-cum-barrages were being constructed by the Karnataka government across Krishna upstream of Jurala project. Telangana ministers said that Karnataka was lifting water illegally over their allocated share which would deny Telangana and Andhra Pradesh their fair share. Karnataka government lashed back saying that similar barrages were constructed by Maharashtra on Godavari, yet Telangana was only attacking Karnataka.
The Krishna water sharing dispute between Andhra Pradesh and Telangana reached the Supreme Court on 16 September 2015. The SC said that it would use the Krishna Water Dispute Tribunal II for reference. However, it would decide if the case was to be confined to Andhra Pradesh and Telangana or the states of Maharashtra and Karnataka needed inclusion.
