Thiruvananthapuram: Unruly scenes prevailed in the Assembly on Thursday over the controversy on the ownership of four dams, including Mullaperiyar.
Chief Minister Oommen Chandy clarified that it was not mentioned in the minutes of the National Committee on Dam Safety (NCDS) meeting that the four dams are owned by Tamil Nadu.
The government decided to refer the matter to the subjects committee of the Assembly on water resources as the Opposition disrupted the House by trooping to the well insisting on a clarification on the silence maintained by the irrigation department chief engineer at the NCDS meeting in which Tamil Nadu claimed ownership of the four dams.
Opposition MLA Ms. Jameela Prakasam (JD-S), who raised the issue in the House on Wednesday, would be a special invitee to the subjects committee, said the Chief Minister.
Speaker G. Karthikeyan suspended the proceedings of the House for about one hour owing to the Opposition’s protest.
According to the Chief Minister, Tamil Nadu officials demanded at the NCDS meeting on December 27, 2013 to mention that Mullaperiyar, Thunakadavu, Peruvaripallam and Parambikulam are owned, operated and maintained by Tamil Nadu.
However, in the subsequent updation of records, it was only mentioned as a footnote below the list of dams in Tamil Nadu that the four dams are located in Kerala and are operated and maintained by Tamil Nadu PWD. The word ‘owned’ was not used.
Moreover, all the four dams are still in the register of dams in Kerala and not in Tamil Nadu’s list, he said during zero-hour.
The Chief Minister also said that state government and the irrigation department had already written to the Central Water Commission to remove the footnote.
Tamil Nadu officials had brought up the issue as an out of the agenda item and that might be the reason why the Kerala irrigation department chief engineer (Ms. P. Lathika) could not object to it, he said.
The minutes of the NCDS meeting would come up for approval in the next meeting and the state would strongly raise its objections, he said.
He also said that in the national register of large dams published in 2009 (while the LDF was in power in the state) these four dams were included in Tamil Nadu’s list. It came to the government’s notice only in 2012, following which the matter was brought to the notice of the CWC and rectifications were done.
