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Water released to Tamil Nadu from Kabini reservoir

By Our Staff Correspondent

MYSORE SEPT. 14. The Karnataka authorities today opened the crest gates of the Kabini reservoir amid unprecedented security and released water to Tamil Nadu.

Sources said that about 9,000 cusecs of water was being released to comply with the Central River Authority's directive even as over 500 armed police personnel stood guard near the reservoir to prevent any untoward incident.

Last week farmers laid siege to the dam and forcibly closed the crest gates to prevent the release of water to Tamil Nadu. Over 3,000 farmers had stormed the reservoir and manhandled the engineers of the dam. The authorities claimed that the crest gates were damaged by the farmers and the mechanism to open and shut the crest gates malfunctioned. Hence, experts had to be called to repair the gates to ensure the flow of water.

Police sources said that adequate security arrangements were in place on Saturday to counter the threat posed by a section of farmers who had threatened to storm the dam once again if water was released.

Mallesh of the Jilla Raitha Hitarakshana Samithi expressed concern over the developments and vowed to lay siege to the dam on Sunday to prevent the release of water. He claimed that 12,000 cusecs of water had been released. This would deplete the water level within a week and the standing crops would be destroyed.

While the farmers felt that about 1 lakh acres on which sugarcane and paddy crops were being cultivated would be affected by the release of water to Tamil Nadu, the authorities were hopeful that the Kabini command area farmers would not be affected. They drew the farmers' attention to the alternative plan devised by the Government to save the standing crops.

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