TN to expedite Palar dam case in SC to stall move

Chennai, Apr 19: Expressing surprise over Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Dr Y S Rajasekara Reddy's remark that construction of a dam across river Palar was certain, the Tamil Nadu government today said it would expedite the case before the Supreme Court to stall the move.

Replying to a special call attention motion given notice of by the main opposition AIADMK, its ally MDMK, the allies of the ruling DMK- Congress, PMK and the Left parties, PWD Minister Duraimurugan told the state Assembly that Dr Reddy's announcement that his goverment was firm on cosntructing the Dam would be the cause of action to expedite the petition before the apex court.

The state PWD secretary was in touch with the officials in Delhi in this regard.

Observing that construction of a dam was violative of the 1892 agreement with regard to sharing of Palar water, he said the state government had not received the Detailed Project Report (DPR) from Andhra Pradesh so far about the dam.

The government fully shared the views and concerns expressed by the members on the issue, he said and expressed shock and surprise over Dr Reddy's remarks in New Delhi that tenders would be called for the dam on April 26 and the foundation stone would be laid next month.

Mr Duraimurugan said even when the PWD Secretary took up the issue with their counterparts in Andhra Pradesh the latter expressed surprise.

''Since only legal steps can be taken in a federal set up, the government will expedite the case pending before the Supreme court and take firm action after consulting Chief Minister M Karunanidhi'', he added.

He said Union Forest Ministry had also not received any proposal from Andhra Pradesh on the construction of the dam, as about 480 acres of forest lands had to acquired for this purpose.

Earlier, the House witnessed noisy scenes for a while, when Speaker R Avudaiyappan suggested that due to shortage of time, PWD Minister could straightaway reply to the motion since the matter had been discussed several times. As the Congress, PMK and the AIADMK demanded a discussion before the minister's reply, the Speaker said Mr C Gnansekaran (Congress) could speak on behalf of all the parties, triggering protests from the main opposition AIADMK.

The AIADMK members argued that being the main opposition, preference should be given to them to talk on the issue.

After noisy scenes for a while, the Speaker allowed a discussion.

Moving the motion, Mr K Pandurangan (AIADMK) wanted to know whether the Andhra Pradesh Government was right in constructing the dam in violation of the 1892 agreement. He also sought to know what action the Tamil Nadu government would take to expedite the case filed before the Supreme court during the previous AIADMK regime to protect the interests of the farmers in Northern districts.

Mr Gnanasekaran asked whether the Tamil Nadu government received the DPR as said by Dr Reddy and favoured Chief Ministerial level talks to sort out the issue. Instead, he also suggested that Chief Minister M Karunanidhi could depute Mr Duraimurugan for talks to protect the interests of fishermen.

While Mr T K Raja (PMK) said the state should not allow the dam construction at any cost, Mr V Sivapunniyam (CPI) wanted the government to take legal steps to stall its construction, a view endorsed by Ms Balabharathi (CPI-M).

Mr Ramakrishnan (MDMK) and Mr Selvam (DPI) said allowing construction of the dam would affect the livelihood of the farmers and wanted the government to take steps to prevent its construction.

UNI