Cauvery dispute: SC accepts Centre's proposal on water-sharing scheme between states

The Centre has suggested maintaining a monthly record of water released every day from the reservoirs, as directed by the CMB.

File photo

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Friday accepted Centre's amended draft scheme outlining the water sharing scheme between Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Puducherry in the decades-old Cauvery water dispute.

The Centre has suggested maintaining a monthly record of water released every day from the reservoirs, as directed by the Cauvery Management Board (CMB).

"The amended draft scheme says in terms of water distributed to Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, the regulation committee of the Cauvery Management Board (CMB) to collect "daily release of water on a monthly basis from the reservoirs as directed by the authority," reported news agency ANI.

After several extensions, the Centre on May 14 had presented its draft proposal to the top court.

The top court was earlier supposed to approve the scheme on May 16.

In a significant verdict to resolve the decades-old Cauvery river water dispute, the Supreme Court on February 16 increased Karnataka's quota by 14.75 thousand million cubic feet (tmcft), taking it to 270 tmcft. It reduced Tamil Nadu's share to 404.25 tmcft, while allowing it to extract 10 tmcft of groundwater from the river basin.

Massive protests broke-out following the verdict across states.

The Supreme Court ordered the Centre to set up the Cauvery Management Board (CMB) and had given it six weeks to do so. That deadline lapsed at the end of March, with the Centre seeking extensions. 

On May 8, the SC warned the Centre that it was in "sheer contempt" of the February 16 verdict by not framing the Cauvery management scheme on river water sharing between the four southern riparian states till now.