The city, whose residents were accused of being indifferent to the Cauvery issue, felt the full impact of the ongoing agitations against release of water to Tamil Nadu on Thursday. The day was marked by picketing, road blocks and flash protests as pro-Kannada and farmers outfits received support from organisations not traditionally associated with linguistic politics.
At noon, the Karnataka Rajya Raitha Sangha (KRRS), led by Kodihalli Chandrashekhar, started its march from the Gandhi statue at Maurya Circle toward Raj Bhavan. At the Governor’s residence, its path was blocked by a large police force and its threat to break through the police cordon resulted in the arrest of over 300.
At the Raj Bhavan
As their numbers depleted with the arrests, around 500 activists of the human rights organisation Nyayakaagi Naavu merged with KRRS and kept up the pressure on the police. Led by Dalit leaders Indudar Honnapura and M. Venkatswamy, the Nyayakaagi Naavu activists tried to shut the Raj Bhavan gates with a padlock. Their attempts were thwarted by the police.
Another wave of protestors, under the banner of State Vehicle Drivers’ Association, attempted to lay siege to the Raj Bhavan.
A delegation of leaders from the organisation submitted a memorandum to the Governor’s office.
They parted with the threat to lay siege to the Krishnaraja Sagar dam in Mandya if the dispute over water sharing is not resolved to their satisfaction.
Smaller protests
Among the many small protests that erupted in different parts of the city, the prominent ones were by the Parveen Kumar Shetty-led faction of the Karnataka Rakshana Vedike, the workers of the Hindustan Aeronautical Ltd. and MICO factory workers.
Mr. Shetty’s men blocked the Magadi Road toll gate, the HAL workers blocked the road in front of their factory in Vimanapura and those from MICO blocked the Hosur Road near Electronics City. Another pro-Kannada outfit, Jaya Karnataka, held a hunger strike near the Town Hall. It announced that the strike would be on until October 8.
Keywords: Cauvery protest, inter-state politics, Cauvery water sharing
Since when did Hindu start applying inflammatory titles to articles?
Is this a calculated stroke to make even the few balanced Tamil
readers who can think a bit objectively become anxious and start
spewing hatred and intolerance, similar to the majority of the Tamil
diaspora across the country do? I used to respect Hindu as being
different from the immoral ToI that cynically distorts and
manufactures news to feed controversies and violent mental reactions
of readers to critical national issues. Has that changed? Has Hindu
become another Tamil newspaper, narrowly focusing on preserving Tamil
rights while not bothering about correcting historical wrongs imposed
on weaker neighbours?
The Grand Anicut, also known as the Kallanai (Tamil: கல்லணை) (kall -stone, anai-bund), is an ancient dam built on the Kaveri River in the state of Tamil Nadu in southern India. It is located about 20 KM from Tiruchirapalli. It was built by the Chola king Karikalan around the 2nd Century AD and is considered one of the oldest water-diversion or water-regulator structures in the world, which is still in use. It still stands as a symbol of Dravidan Engineering. Now Kallanai doesn't have water. Thanks to ...........
Where else in the world can you find such large demonstrations for denying water to fellow citizens? Mera Bharat Mahan!
CRA has not given proper Order. karnataka need 140 TMC of water till next rainy season but right now they have only 67 TMC of water from all water resources that is less than half of what the sate required and As the Tamilnadu govt said they need 123 TMC of water for Samba corp and drinking water, from Metturu and Biligundlu Dams they will get more than 90 TMC of water.Supreme Court should analyze the data and give proper judgement otherwise it will create big issue and also Govt's should not play politics in sharing water as this year Drought in Karnataka State.
all the people of India, should feel Indian first. Then the parties trying to use linguistic politics will fail either in Karnataka or TN.
No one is arguing against a peaceful demonstraation on any issue. But we should make sure it is voluntary and not out of compulsion. But in our great democracy I found it is almost always other way. People of Karnataka should be allowed to protest in peace in any manner for any number of days but at the same time even if an ant is disturbed by their protest the punishment should be severe that would be a deterrent for anyother citizens in the future. But at the same time the supreme court and if needed the Indian army should be in full action to make sure the water flows to Tamilnadu as per the rule of law.
Cauvery water dispute is probably the most politicised issue in our country. If Governments and Court(s) are doing their job, why do people meddle with it? What do HAL or MICO workers have to do with Cauvery water? We are talking of linking Ganges and Cauvery but Cauvery alone creates so much trouble. When will we find a permanent solution to such crucial issues? Till then, the ordinary citizen must maintain a true national spirit than being cowed down by narrow regional politics.
Report doesn't seems like someone is holding it for ransom. Bangalore receives almost all of its water from Cauvery, the reality of water shortage will hold the city for ransom if water is depleted from cauvery reservoir soon.
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