A team of officers from the Mahadayi PRAWAH (Progressive River Authority for Water and Harmony) visited Belagavi district on July 7, as part of its tour of three riparian states of the Mahadayi river.
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They visited Chorla and Kanakumbi apart from the project sites of Kalasa and Bandori and held a meeting with officials of irrigation and other departments. M - PRAWAH Charman P M Scott, members — chief engineer Veerendra Sharma, hydrology engineer Manoj Tewari, and others like Milind Nayak and Subhash Chandra were present.
Kannada organisations had objected to this visit and had urged the state government to stop it. They had suspected that Goa could sabotage the visit and use it against Karnataka’s interests. Their fears were based on some claims by Goa CM Pramod Sawant that Goa would use the meeting as evidence against Karnataka in its legal fight against the Mahadayi project. Mr. Sawant had accused Karnataka of irregularities and said that the PRAWAH team inspection would be used as evidence in court. The central committee of Kannada organisations had written a letter to the CM Siddharamaiah opposing the visit.
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Irrigation department sources, however, deny that there was any danger in the visit. “There was nothing in Sunday’s visit that could point towards obstruction of the Mahadayi basin projects. It was a routine visit, that was unfortunately politicised by the Goa CM,” a senior officer said.
The M PRAWAH team will visit Bengaluru on July 8, where it will hold a meeting with officials of the irrigation department and others. Official sources said that the agenda for the Bengaluru meeting includes a discussion on DPR of Virdi large irrigation project in Maharashtra, copies of which have been distributed to all members, and administrative issues like partitioning and other works for the temporary office of the authority at the cyclone relief centre at Porvorim in Goa, engagement of consultants for membership, administrative and financial tasks, and the contribution of ₹1.67 crore from members and ₹5 crore from the centre.
“There is nothing on the agenda about the Kalasa or Bandori nala projects. In fact the full authority has not been constituted till now. Only official members are there. The three riparian states are supposed to nominate their representatives to the Authority. That has not been yet. Even the chairman is not a full time member. Till that time, Any decision by the Authority will not be viewed seriously by the three states,” an irrigation department officer said.