Cauvery water row: Ban order in Bengaluru, Dr G Parameshwar takes stock of situation
Bengaluru/Mysuru: Following violent protests in which nearly 60 buses were torched, and several stone pelting incidents, Home Minister, Dr G. Parameshwar on Monday declared the state government has decided to clamp Section 144 in Bengaluru and areas that come under the Cauvery river basin.
Dr Parameshwar confirmed that the city police has arrested Venkatesh, a close friend of Santhosh, a Tamilian who had posted scathing remarks against Karnataka on his social media site. Santosh and his family members have gone underground, after his post led to violent protests in the city. The minister appealed to people to maintain peace instead of indulging in violent protests.
Speaking to reporters after a meeting with police top brass, Dr Parameshwar said, “We have taken 200 people into preventive custody to prevent the situation from going out of control. We have requested the Centre to deploy 10 more companies of paramilitary police, apart from the 10 companies already deployed in various parts of the city and the Cauvery river basin. Besides this, we will also deploy 20,000 homeguards to maintain peace,” he said.
He said police are aware that they had to deal with Bakrid and Ganesha festivals amid the Cauvery row. “Yes, I agree that SC verdict is a great injustice as far as Karnataka is concerned. But, we cannot keep quiet if protests turn violent,” he said.
KRS level dips to 89 feet
Even as the agitation over the Cauvery dispute turned violent in the state, as much as 16,222 cusecs of water was released from the Krishna Raja Sagar and Kabini reservoirs to Tamil Nadu for the seventh consecutive day on Monday, leaving KRS with only 89.05 feet of water.
Currently the reservoirs in the Cauvery catchment area have a live storage of a mere 34.99 TMC ft. Following the Supreme Court’s order of September 5, Karnataka has released 6.44 TMC ft of water (as on Sunday) to Tamil Nadu, according to sources in the water resources department. Since June it has released as much as 41.43 tmc ft of water to the neighbouring state, they reveal. “As the Cauvery catchment area has already received 90 per cent of its expected rainfall this year, even if it now gets normal rainfall it will make little difference to the storage of the reservoirs. With the catchment area receiving 28 per cent deficit rain, the reservoirs have received 48 per cent deficit inflow this year. The available water is only enough to meet the drinking water needs of Bengaluru, Mysuru, Hassan, Tumkur and villages enroute. There is absolutely no water for irrigation,” said director of the Karnataka State Natural Disaster Monitoring Centre, Dr G S Srinivas Reddy. Kabini had 2272.48 feet of water on Monday. At Hemavathi, the water level was 2883.75 feet, and at Harangi, it was 2848.18 feet.
