The fact that the present Tamil Nadu government is seen as weak and amenable to the BJP has created greater worry in Tamil Nadu about its ability to protect the interests of the state. State governments and political parties in Tamil Nadu, led by M Karunanidhi and Late J Jayalalithaa, have been powerful and have asserted themselves at the Centre. This is precisely why a Cauvery Management Board, independent of electoral compulsions and monitored by the Centre, has been suggested by the Supreme Court.
Presently, it would seem the stakes are higher in Karnataka. A central government will behave exactly like state government depending on where its electoral stakes are higher. To trust that the central government will be non-partisan in this dispute would be naive. In both cases, the demand for water and the release of it is not just governed by availability, but also has a large dose of political and electoral considerations.įor instance, in election season, even if there is a fair availability of water, the party in power in Karnataka could not afford to be seen as giving water away to Tamil Nadu and in Tamil Nadu a party cannot be seen as failing the interests of the state. Tamil Nadu fears that without a Cauvery Management Board, Karnataka will not implement any directive and it will not receive water as per the verdict of the apex court. Instead, it has suggested an advisory committee. With elections just a few days away, the central government led by the BJP, which hopes to wrest Karnataka from the Congress, is not setting up a management board as it could prove costly in Karnataka. It is precisely this inability to ensure that a fair settlement is implemented and water is released in time for standing crop that a Cauvery Management Board (CMB) was ordered by the apex court.Īs the upper riparian state, Karnataka has opposed the formation of such a board as it fears that it will lose control over the sluice gates of large dams like Krishna Raja Sagar dam, and be forced to release water. For instance, in 2016 Karnataka failed to implement the court’s orders to release water to Tamil Nadu and instead passed a resolution in the state legislature against such a release. In this backdrop, there is no other institution but the Supreme Court that can settle this dispute and even the SC has often found it difficult to implement decisions or orders passed by it in a dispute year. Thirdly, reliance on the river is only increasing with each passing year as groundwater sources are depleting. Secondly, there is little or no effort to readjust and seriously rework cropping patterns in both states to adapt to changing demands from the river. It is this manipulative identity politics and linguistic chauvinism in Karnataka and Tamil Nadu that has ensured that no negotiated, mature, politically acceptable solution is possible for the Cauvery dispute between the two states.įirstly, it is a deficit river and cannot satisfy the needs of all riparian states completely even in a normal year.
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