Stressing that no state can claim ownership of a river, the Supreme Court (SC) on Friday reduced Tamil Nadu’s share of Cauvery water to 177.25 thousand million cubic (TMC) while increased the share of Karnataka by 14.7 TMC.
The verdict of 3-judge bench comprising of Chief Justice Dipak Misra, Justices AM Khanwilkar and DY Chandrachud said that keeping in mind the global status of Karnataka’s capital city of Bengaluru, it needed more water.
The SC also said that 20 TMC of ground water in Tamil Nadu had not been accounted for and needed to be seen. Tamil Nadu earlier got 192 TMC of Cauvery water.
The verdict which will be valid for 15 years is likely to bring an end to the decades-old dispute over water sharing between the two southern states.
The apex court had on September 20 last year reserved the verdict on the appeals filed by Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala against the 2007 award of the Cauvery Water Dispute Tribunal (CWDT) on sharing of water.
The decades-old Cauvery water dispute was decided unanimously by CWDT in 2007, after determining the total availability of water in the Cauvery basin at 740 TMC feet at the Lower Coleroon Anicut site, including 14 TMC ft for environmental protection.