Chief Minister Siddaramaiah has said that he has convened a meeting of MLAs and the MP from Mandya on Wednesday to discuss releasing water from the KRS dam to neighbouring Tamil Nadu.
Speaking to media persons upon his arrival in the district on Tuesday, the chief minister said that the quantity of water to be released will be decided based on the availability of water in the reservoir. The decision will be taken during a meeting of elected representatives of all other districts coming under the Cauvery delta on August 19.
The chief minister said that while the available storage recorded is 53 TMC feet, there is a requirement of 35 TMC for irrigation and 30 TMC for drinking water purpose. As per the crisis agreement, the state has released 12 TMC as against the committed 21 TMC water.
Saying that state is expected to receive rain this month, the chief minister said that cloud seeding has been planned as an alternative, with measures being taken to start it from the month-end, after studying the exact places to take up the initiative.
Letter to Centre
On the prevailing drought situation in the state, the chief minister said that he has written to the centre. On the other hand, an all-party delegation will be taken to New Delhi. Although a similar exercise was conducted in the past to tide over the crisis of Cauvery and Mahadayi, there was no positive response from the Central government.
The chief minister also made a mockery of BJP state president B S Yeddyurappa for not raising the issue of loan waiver for farmers. While the state has waived the crop loans advanced by cooperative banks, the BJP has failed to exert pressure on the Central government to waive the loans advanced by nationalised banks.
He also questioned the stand of the Central government, when the same dispensation had decided to write off the loans advanced to industrialists to the tune of Rs 81,000 crore.
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