Southern States - Karnataka   

Cong. asks Govt. not to release water

By Our Special Correspondent

BANGALORE SEPT. 6. The Congress, which is the ruling party in Karnataka, has criticised the Supreme Court order directing the State to release 1.25 tmcft of Cauvery water to Tamil Nadu daily and urged the Government against complying with the order. The advice comes two days after the Government decided to abide by the court directive after eliciting the views of all parties at a meeting.

An emergency meeting of the executive committee of the KPCC today adopted a resolution claiming that the Supreme Court directive violated the Inter-State River Water Disputes Act of 1956, and failed to keep the realities of the situation in view. The court order had struck a blow to the livelihood of the people of the State. "This meeting urges the Government not to release the 1.25 tmcft of water a day to Tamil Nadu."

The Chief Minister, S.M. Krishna, who was scheduled to attend the meeting, could not do so as he left for Delhi. The KPCC president, Allum Veerabhadrappa, released copies of the four resolutions adopted at the meeting to presspersons.

The Congress was not prepared to sacrifice the interests of the people of the State under any circumstances. The meeting urged the Prime Minister, A.B. Vajpayee, to convene a meeting of the Cauvery River Authority on Saturday to resolve the crisis.

Mr. Veerabhadrappa defended the participation of Congress workers in the agitation against releasing water in Mandya and other places. The protest could not be viewed on party lines.

As expected, the executive committee hit out at the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister, J. Jayalalithaa, for her campaign against the AICC president, Sonia Gandhi.

In a resolution on Ms. Sonia Gandhi's foreign origin issue, the KPCC said the NDA Government recently submitted an affidavit to the Supreme Court averring that the action of the then President (K.R. Narayanan) in 1998 to invite Ms. Gandhi to form a Government at the Centre was according to the law. The statements of Ms. Jayalalithaa, who belonged to the tinsel world, were against the Constitution, he said.

On the abduction of the former Minister, H. Nagappa, by the forest brigand, Veerappan, the KPCC president said the party wanted the Government to handle the matter with the same seriousness with which it dealt with the abduction of the thespian, Rajkumar, two years ago. The resolution appealed to the people to shun individuals, organisations and political parties that sought to lend caste colour to the abduction issue. The executive committee welcomed the Cabinet decision to waive interest of Rs. 127 crores on farm loans totalling Rs. 975 crores obtained from the cooperative institutions.

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