‘Reducing wastage, water conservation way forward to resolve Cauvery crisis’

Former Director V.K. Nataraj emphasizes water conservation to resolve Cauvery crisis, promoting optimal utilization and reducing waste.

Calling for optimal utilisation of water and reducing waste V.K. Nataraj, former Director, Madras Institute of Development Studies, said that it was the way forward to resolve Cauvery crisis.

He was speaking at a programme to mark the release of Kananda version of the book Cauvery Dispute: A Historical Perspective, here on Sunday. The book has been authored by former Commissioner of Police of Mysuru C. Chandrashekar.

Mr. Nataraj said the book provides a good historical perspective but correcting historical wrongs was unrealistic. The way forward was to reduce wastage, promote conservation, and harness the available water optimally. “There is wastage of water on both the sides – Karnataka and Tamil Nadu – and this has to be curbed going forward,” he added.

Mr. Nataraj also called for promoting the non-political ”Cauvery Family” comprising farmers and other stakeholders from both States to think of resolving the crisis. He decried the tendency to seek legal solutions to every problem and said that there were issues that encapsulated technical, political, social, economic, cultural and other issues, and Cauvery crisis was one such example.

He said environmental issues never received the importance that was due in the past but the negative fallout of climate change was a reality in the present times due to floods, droughts, and other natural calamities. Hence focus on conservation of water and reduction of pollution was also important, said Mr. Nataraj.

Mr. Chandrashekar in his book has provided a historical perspective of the crisis, recounted major milestones and its fallout on Karnataka.

Prof. Krishne Gowda, an academician, recalled the contours of Cauvery agitation and said that public participation in such issues would decline in the days ahead. He attributed this to growing tendency among political parties to increase their membership drive among the general public. This, he said, will limit their perspective to party views and there will not be many activists of the non-political variety to take up public interest causes.