The Punjab government will not back down from its position on the construction of the Satluj Yamuna Link (SYL) canal. The Punjab CM categorically said the state does not have any water to share with Haryana or land to build the canal after the original landowners were given their land back in 2016.

This is the third time the chief ministers of Punjab and Haryana met at the behest of the central government following a directive issued by the Supreme Court in this regard. Union Minister for Jal Shakti Gajendra Shekhawat has convened a meeting on Thursday night to find a “way to resolve the long-standing issue.” Such meetings have been convened twice before, once on January 4 this year and another on August 18, 2020. Shekhawat had served as a mediator between the CMOs of the two states but the negotiations ended in a stalemate. The next hearing in the case in the Supreme Court is scheduled for January 2024.

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It is learnt that Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann spent the last two days in holding preliminary talks with Water Resources Department officials. The Chief Minister is expected to give alternative solutions at the meeting on Thursday. These include creating a new tribunal to re-evaluate the availability of Ravi-Beas waters with new terms and references, taking into account Punjab’s severe groundwater and river water depletion issues and including Punjab as a beneficiary in the Sharda Yamuna Link canal project. The hearing in the case will be postponed until a decision is made regarding the Ravi-Beas tribunal.

Sources say that the CM will also demand a review of the Yamuna Water Sharing Agreement of 1994 between Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Delhi and Haryana, and ask for Punjab’s inclusion in water sharing.

Punjab will also draw attention to the fact that despite not having any riparian rights on the Ravi and Beas rivers, Rajasthan and Haryana received a far larger portion of their waters in 1981 when the SYL canal was first proposed. He will also bring up the fact that the state’s water allotment was subsequently lowered to 13.25 million acre feet (MAF) from its original 17.17 MAF. Furthermore, Punjab won’t be able to provide any more of its river resources due to the state’s drastically declining groundwater table.