Fixing the boundary is the key

Speaking to Deccan Herald he said, “Fixing the boundary is the key. There is no revenue map available for Hogenakal. Once the map is done, it will be proved that the project area belongs to Karnataka. TN should wait till then. Otherwise our State will have no option to take legal action,” he stated.

As Tamil Nadu’s drinking water project is coming up at a disputed area at Hogenakal, Karnataka has been insisting that the project should not be implemented until the inter-State boundary is demarcated. Karnataka has been claiming that the entire project area comes under its jurisdiction.

The Karnataka revenue secretary K S Prabhakar has, in a letter dated April 22 to the Surveyor General of India, urged to immediately take up a joint verification of inter-State boundary at Hogenakkal. "The matter has become most important after TN has launched a water project in the disputed area without consulting our State. Hence, you are requested to take immediate action to resolve the decade-old issue," the secretary stated in the letter, a copy of which is available with this newspaper.

Another major concern of Karnataka is water utilisation under the project. It is alleging that TN has deviated from the original plan, approved by the Centre in 1998, and re-drawn the project to utilise 2.1 tmc ft water against the sanctioned 1.4 tmc ft. TN, on its part, has been refuting Karnataka's charges, and going ahead with the project implementation.