KERALA WANTS NATIONAL PARTIES TO SPELL STAND ON MULLAPERIYAR DAM

KERALA WANTS NATIONAL PARTIES TO SPELL STAND ON MULLAPERIYAR DAM

Expressing deep concern over the delay in scrapping the 116-year-old Mullaperiyar Dam on Kerala-Tamil Nadu border, Kerala Water Resources Minister P.J. Joseph Tuesday ,22^nd November,2011,urged national parties to spell out their stand on the issue. "This is an issue that concerns millions of people living downstream the unsafe dam. There should not be any delay in building a new dam after de-commissioning the existing one," he told reporters at his home town at Thodupuzha.

"The national parties should make their stand clear and the issue should also be debated in parliament", he said. Frequent tremors in Idukki District, where the dam is located, had intensified the fears of the people about the danger posed by it, he said. In view of recurrence of mild tremors in the area, the government would hold a meeting of experts Wednesday to discuss reports on the situation drawn up by the Centre for Earth Science Studies (CESS) and the core technical team on Mullaperiyar, headed by a former chief engineer, Joseph said. According to official reports, as many as 22 mild tremors and after-vibrations occurred in parts of Idukki and adjoining Kottayam and Pathanamthitta districts since January this year. The dam was built when the area was part of the Travancore princely state and Tamil Nadu under the British rule.

It has since then been a major irrigation source for the agricultural belt of southern Tamil Nadu districts. For the past two decades however, the dam has become a subject of hot dispute between the neighbouring states. Tamil Nadu, holding control of the dam, has been locked in a legal battle over increasing the storage level in the reservoir while Kerala is opposed to it and proposed construction of a new dam citing safety concerns.

                                                                Prof. John Kurakar