AP, TS back Centre’s river dispute Bill

Hyderabad: The Andhra Pradesh and Telangana governments, which supported the Inter-State River Water Disputes (Amendment) Bill, 2019, in the Lok Sabha on Wednesday, are hoping for an early resolution to the dispute over sharing Krishna water.

The Bill mandates that a tribunal will deliver the final award in two years and whenever it gives the order, the verdict will be notified automatically.

Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao has been finding fault with the delay by water dispute tribunals in reso-lving interstate water disputes and has demanded the constitution of a permanent Inter-State River Water Dispute Tribunal and a National Water Policy.

After the formation of the state of Telangana in 2014, the TRS government approached the Krishna Water Tribunal (constituted in 1969) to resolve the issue of sharing of water in the Krishna Basin by Telangana and Andhra Pradesh.

Mr Rao has alleged that the Tribunal has not passed its final award though nearly six years have elapsed.

During the debate on the Inter-State River Water Disputes (Amendment) Bill, 2019, in the Lok Sabha on Wednesday, the TRS MP Nama Nageswara Rao, while supporting the Bill, demanded that a National Water Policy be formulated and mentioned that the provisions of the current Bill are not enough to resolve the water disputes.

He pointed out that 70,000 TMC (2,000 million cubic feet) water was going into the sea while the irrigation requirement of the whole country was 40,000 TMC, and 10,000 TMC was needed for drin-king and for industries.

He said his party has been demanding a national water policy for a long time.

YSR Congress MP Mithun Reddy, while supporting the Bill, said that river water disputes should be resolved within six months instead of two years and in view of increasing demand for water for irrigation, drinking, and industrial use, disputes regarding the sharing of waters should be resolved in a time-bound manner.

Though the governments of both the Telugu states are of the opinion that the Bill paves the way to resolve the dispute quickly, V Prakash Rao, chairman of the Telangana Water Resources Development Corporation has his doubts.

As of now, he pointed out that there are nine tribunals, including those on the Cauvery, Mahadayi, Ravi and Beas, Vamshadhara and Krishna rivers, but the disputes have not been resolved.

The dispute could be resolved quickly only if the tribunal has benches in different states.

“I feel if the Brijesh Kumar tribunal resolves the water dispute between AP and Telangana before the new Act comes into force, both the states will benefit. Otherwise, the case will have to be heard by the new tribunal right from the beginning, which will further delay the matter,” Mr Prakash Rao said.