Mahanadi water dispute: Centre betrayed Odisha, says ruling-BJD

Bhubaneswar: Alleging that the Centre betrayed Odisha by violating the law and not keeping its commitment to constitute a tribunal to resolve the Mahanadi water dispute, the State government today said it would draw the attention of the Supreme Court which is scheduled to hear a case in this regard early next month.

The ruling BJD government alleged that the Centre is intentionally delaying the formation of a tribunal to resolve the Mahanadi water dispute with Chhattisgarh.

BJD vice-president Prasanna Acharya said that the Centre has once again betrayed the people of Odisha by violating the law of the land. He alleged that the Modi-led central government has been supporting the 'illegal' activities of Chhattisgarh government which constructed barrages on the upstream of Mahanadi without consulting Odisha.

The BJD would not tolerate such kind of ‘injustice’ towards the State and intensify its agitation against the Centre's ‘anti-Odisha’ attitude, said Acharya.

Meanwhile, Odisha Water Resources secretary, PK Jena said "We will raise the tribunal issue in the Supreme Court which will hear a case filed by the State government in the first week of December."

The deadline for formation of tribunal ended yesterday. Even though the Centre had earlier informed the apex court that it was preparing documents for formation of a tribunal, it failed to meet the deadline, said Jena.

Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeking his personal intervention for early formation of a tribunal, but it yielded no results, he added.