The southern Indian state of Karnataka was on high security alert yesterday after a tribunal ruled against it in a century-old water dispute that triggered deadly riots in 1991, officials said.
Schools, colleges and businesses were shut as politicians across the state protested Monday's verdict.
After 17 years of often bitter deliberations, the Cauvery Waters Disputes Tribunal found in favor of neighboring Tamil Nadu and awarded it far more river water than Karnataka.
Riot police, who patrolled the streets of the state capital Bangalore overnight, were still out in force early yesterday, an AFP reporter said.
Security had also been tightened along Karnataka's borders with Tamil Nadu, the Press Trust of India (PTI) news agency reported.
"There is anger that we got less water," auto-rickshaw driver Mohammed Ansari said.
"Traffic is thinner than normal, most shops are closed," he added.
Many Indian and foreign technology firms, based in the IT hub of Bangalore, said they feared they would have to stay closed yesterday.
The Cauvery river rises in Karnataka and flows into the Bay of Bengal through Tamil Nadu.
Its waters -- fed by India's June to September monsoon rains -- irrigate crops and provide drinking supplies to the states of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, as well as neighboring Kerala and Pondicherry.
The tribunal, set up in 1990, awarded Tamil Nadu 12 billion cubic meters of the estimated total 21 billion cubic meters of Cauvery waters. Karnataka was given 7.5 billion cubic meters, with the rest shared by the other two states.
Karnataka chief minister H.D. Kumaraswamy called an all-party meeting for later yesterday to review the ruling, with newspapers saying officials were "shocked."
The minister told PTI that steps had been taken to maintain law and order in the wake of the award and appealed to farmers and other organizations to maintain peace.
The Tamil Nadu chief minister M. Karunnandihi welcomed the order, voicing hoped that Karnataka would implement it.
The modern dispute began in 1974 when an agreement inked in 1892 on the sharing of the waters lapsed.
That was the year when the British Madras presidency (now Tamil Nadu) forced the Maharaja-ruled Mysore (modern Karnataka) not to use the Cauvery waters without its permission.
The bickering has continued ever since, with the two states repeatedly resorting to legal action to win a bigger share of the waters.
A 1991 interim court order telling Karnataka to release 6 billion cubic meters of water to Tamil Nadu sparked riots against minority Tamils in Bangalore, leaving about 20 people dead.
Karnataka cable operators across the state have previously blacked out Tamil-language satellite channels and banned Tamil films to show their resentment in the past.
The Hindu newspaper called the tribunal's decision "eminently implementable," describing it as "a just and equitable settlement of ... an issue that has defied all attempts at negotiations and mediation."
The daily urged political leaders from both states to accept the deal and forget "chauvinism."
The agriculture sector -- heavily reliant on the monsoons -- employs two-thirds of India's work force and contributes up to a quarter of India's economic growth.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of
A prominent Christian leader has allegedly been stabbed at the altar during a Mass yesterday in southwest Sydney. Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel was saying Mass at Christ The Good Shepherd Church in Wakeley just after 7pm when a man approached him at the altar and allegedly stabbed toward his head multiple times. A live stream of the Mass shows the congregation swarm forward toward Emmanuel before it was cut off. The church leader gained prominence during the COVID-19 pandemic, amassing a large online following, Officers attached to Fairfield City police area command attended a location on Welcome Street, Wakeley following reports a number