Bangalore: Bid against diverting Netravati river gathers steam

The Netravati diversion project got a big jolt Tuesday when more than 300 activists gathered at this agrarian town and took an oath to protect the river water as they would protect their mother.

“For all practical reasons, Netravati is indeed mother of more than 40 lakh people whose life depends on it. Seven lakh of them are agriculturists who cultivate paddy on more than 35,000 hectares of land. The government has done a great injustice by setting aside Rs1,000 crore for initiating the project,” said MG Hegde, leader of the Sahyadri Samrakshna Sanchya, which held the pooja at Buntwal.

Dinesh Holla, another leader of the organisation, told dna: “I have no idea why the people of Dakshina Kannada are not involved in this movement in big numbers. It is a question of their survival. The district has only one water source, which also fed the city of Mangalore and its giant industries. Moreover, the sweet water from the river maintains the salinity of the Arabian sea. It is the only major West-flowing river in the Southern parts of the West coast and its sweet water flowing into the Arabian sea sustains marine life and also the livelihood of more than seven lakh fishermen in Udupi, Dakshina Kannada and Uttara Kannada districts.”

There is an intense political lobbying for diverting Nethravati river from West to East on the pretext of acute shortage of water in Eastern districts of Tumkur, Chikkaballapur and Bangalore Rural.
“The project report authored by Paramashivaiah had failed to mention the economic and environmental feasibility and also the impact on flora and fauna of the Western ghats region, but with the Kasturirangan report in limelight, it needs to be seen if such mega projects could be taken up in the Western Ghats. We are studying the report to this effect,” activists said.

There is a hidden agenda behind the aim of implementing the project. The diverted water is supposed to fill nearly 300 irrigation tanks and to supply water to the industrial township of Doddaballapur, besides filling up the reservoir in Chamarajanagar. The project is also intended to rejuvenate the East bound rivers. Therefore drinking water supply to Kolar and Chikkaballapur is evidently the last preference.

K Vijaykumar Shetty of Karavali Jeevanadi-Nethravati Rakshana Samithi, which is also taking up the cause, said the project cannot be taken up just because there are more MLAs in the nine districts that are the beneficiary districts of the Nethravati diversion plan. He said one should look at more than two lakh hectares of land that is being irrigated by the river, its importance to the ecology, maintaining salinity of the Arabian sea, the nutrient supply to the vast marine life and also the drinking water needs of city of Mangalore. He said if this project was taken up, Mangalore will have not only less water for domestic purposes, but also for the industrial purpose, which will discourage the large investments coming into the state.