The All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) leader and Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa on Wednesday affirmed that the water storage level in Mullaperiyar dam “will soon be raised up to 142 feet in accordance with the Supreme Court judgment.”
Joining issue with her political archrival, the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) President, M Karunanidhi, on this issue in the wake of the Kerala Government filing a petition in the Supreme court seeking a “review” of its May 7 Judgment in the Mullaperiyar case allowing Tamil Nadu to raise the water level up to 142 feet, Ms. Jayalalithaa dubbed the former’s posers as extraneous and “appeared to be provoking Kerala” to consider further actions that could go against Tamil Nadu’s interests.
Cautioning that such “provocative anti-farmer statements” by Mr. Karunanidhi could rebound on him as people of Tamil Nadu will not tolerate such acts, Ms. Jayalalithaa made clear that Kerala’s June 30 review petition in the Apex Court neither sought a stay of the judgment nor pleaded for prohibiting the meetings of the ‘Supervisory Committee-
formed to oversee the implementation of the Supreme Court’s order-, until the disposal of the appeal. When this is the factual position, the DMK leader should not mislead the people, she stressed.
Thanks to the efforts of the AIADMK Government, an ‘experts committee’ was set up that eventually paved way for a judicial resolution of the Mullaperiyar issue rendering justice to Tamil Nadu, Ms Jayalalithaa pointed out. More recently, in compliance with the Supreme Court’s order, the Union Water Resources Ministry had notified on July 1 the constitution of the ‘Supervisory Committee’, which would facilitate and oversee the process of raising the water level in the dam to 142 feet.
Ms. Jayalalithaa further pointed out that the first meeting of the ‘Supervisory Committee’ had already met in Thiruvananthapuram on July 8 and the next meeting was slated for July 17. Thus, when the process of raising the water level in the Mullaperiyar dam up to 142 feet had been initiated in line with the Supreme Court’s order, Mr. Karunanidhi had resorted to issuing such statements, “as he does not want the AIADMK Government to get the credit for this achievement,” she said, lambasting the DMK leader.
