BELAGAVI: The Supreme court will hear the border dispute case between Karnataka and Maharashtra at 2 pm on April 1. Maharashtra had filed a suit in the SC in 2002 demanding the merger of Belagavi, Khanapur, Nippani, Karwar, Bidar, Balki and 814 villages of Karnataka into Maharashtra.
Though, Karnataka and the Union government which are the responding parties of the case were ready, Maharashtra kept on postponing the case by asking for new dates. People of the district are curious as Maharashtra is expected to plead its stand on that day.
Karnataka, the first respondent, had pleaded that the case must be dismissed as changing the geographical border lines between states would not come under its limit and only the Centre has that power.
However, retired Jammu and Kashmir Chief Justice R M Lodha, whom the Supreme Court has appointed to collect evidence on the matter, had said the SC has rights on the matter.
Based on Maharashtra’s appeal, retired Chief Justice of India Y B Chandrachud studied whether the case was worth hearing in the SC for two years and in 2004 advised to file a case.
Karnataka took the matter lightly but had to bow to the protests of Kannada organisations and formed the Border Legal Advisory Committee and appointed Belagavi-based Justice H B Datar as its chief.
The committee collected the required documentation to prove to Maharashtra that the places it has sought are part and parcel of Karnataka.
After Justice Datar’s death in 2008, retired Justice Ramkrishna was appointed the committees chairman. As there were complaints that the committee was non-functional, the government dissolved it and established the Border Protection Commissioner, appointing Justice V S Malimath as its chief.
However, Justice Malimath died in December.