Pennaiyar River Dispute | 'Mediation Process Has Failed' : Tamil Nadu And Karnataka Govts Tell Supreme Court

The Supreme Court was informed today that mediation process between the States of Tamil Nadu and Karnataka in relation to the dispute over sharing of Pennaiyar river water resources has failed.

The matter was before a bench of Justices Hrishikesh Roy and SVN Bhatti, which granted 2 weeks' time to the Union (which facilitated the mediation) to produce the Negotiation Committee's report.

Briefly put, the dispute was brought to the top court by State of Tamil Nadu in form of a suit under Article 131 of the Constitution against State of Karnataka and Union of India. Over the course of hearings, it was suggested that as negotiations between the States did not result in a solution, the Union government may constitute a Tribunal to do the needful.

However, eventually, the Union apprised the court that a request had been received on behalf of State of Karnataka to the effect that its newly constituted government would like to re-explore the possibility of settling the dispute with Tamil Nadu through negotiations. State of Karnataka supported the same, contending that the new government, which was elected in May, 2023, had had no opportunity to negotiate with State of Tamil Nadu with respect to the dispute. Counsels for Tamil Nadu, on the other hand, objected by asserting that the Union had initiated the process for constitution of a Tribunal, however, went back on it.

In response, the State of Karnataka pressed that a Tribunal could be constituted only after Central government was of the opinion that the dispute could not be resolved through negotiations.

In January this year, directing constitution of a new Negotiation Committee, the top Court noted that under Section 4 of the Inter-States River Water Disputes Act, 1956, a Tribunal can be constituted only after the Central government is of the opinion that the water dispute cannot be settled by negotiations. It further recorded that the time limit for completion of the negotiation process is also specified in the Act as 1 year.

"With the aforesaid request made on behalf of the newly elected government of Karnataka and the fact that the Committee constituted on January 20, 2020 failed to make any serious endeavor for resolution of the water dispute between the two States, we deem it appropriate to direct the Ministry of Jal Shakti, Government of India to constitute a fresh Negotiation Committee as envisaged under Section 4(1) of the Act. The notification constituting the Committee be issued within 2 weeks", the court said.

Case Title: The State of Tamil Nadu v. The State of Karnataka and Anr., Original Suit No. 1/2018 

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