THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The deep concerns of the state over the Mullaperiyar dam, expressed by an all-party meet held here after the apex court passed the crucial verdict of allowing Tamil Nadu to raise the water level to 142 feet,was presented by Chief Minister Oommen Chandy and Opposition leader V S Achuthanandan to the Prime Minister on Tuesday. The concerns were raised from the perspective of safety while reiterating that Kerala would never block the rightful share of water to the neighbouring state. Seeking a political and personal intervention, Modi has been urged by the two leaders to prevail upon Tamil Nadu for the construction of a new dam and till then, to maintain the water-level in the more than a century-old dam at maximum 136 feet only.
The Mullaperiyar dam issue had caused tremendous concern in Kerala about the dam’ssafety and fears of a catastrophe in the event of a failure of the dam as it would cause loss of lakhs of people’s lives and damage to properties, a memorandum submitted to Modi by the state underscores.
Salient points in the memorandum are: *Intervene in the matter to impress upon Tamil Nadu, the apprehensions of the people of Kerala and to get Tamil Nadu to agree to the construction of a new dam, which will continue to meet the water demand of the latter while at the same time not endangering the lives and properties of the people of Kerala.
Until a consensus is reached on the construction of a new dam, impress upon Tamil Nadu to ensure that storage level in the dam is maintained around 136 feet so as to avoid the contingency of a sudden discharge, and flooding of the downstream areas of the dam, in the event of huge inflows into the dam.
Impress upon the chairman of the Supervisory Committee and the Central Water Commission to ensure a fair hearing, addressing Kerala’s concerns. The chairman may ensure that Tamil Nadu should not build up storage above 136 ft if any one of the 13 spillway gates is not functional.The operational efficiency of the 13 spillway gates and the capacity of the generator power to operate these gates in the event of an emergency has to be reviewed- something which the committee has not done due to objections from Tamil Nadu.
The joint memorandum also pointed out that the supervisory committee was constituted on the directive of the apex court to allay the fears and apprehensions of the people living downstream of the dam and thus is duty bound to ensure adequate measures to fulfil it.