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Cauvery Calling Panel 4
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Asian College Of Journalism
2:17
Hello and welcome to the fourth panel of "Interrogating Cauvery Calling." The panelists on stage are Dr S. Janakarajan, President South Asia Consortium for Interdisciplinary Water Resources Studies and Mr S. Ranganathan, General Secretary, Tamil Nadu Cauvery Delta Farmers Welfare Association. The panel would be moderated by Dr Venkatesh Athreya, Economist.
2:21
2:24
S Ranganathan opens the discussion with a very poignant observation. The Cauvery case was lying in Court for many years. It was the Former Chief Minister Karunanidhi that had asked for a tribunal.
2:25
He says that the meeting with the leaders from Karnataka and Tamil Nadu in Bangalore was important for the Cauvery case. This indeed was a milestone event in this regard.
2:27
S Ranganathan is of the view that 150 years of dispute can be solved by striking good relationship. Later we had a team of chief secretaries from East Africa come to Chennai for a seminar on the Cauvery dispute.
This is crucial to ensure food security, and to obtain this, better water management is needed.
2:29
He elucidates, "Any place with the availability of water and soil decides the kind of crop."
2:31
Ranganathan states that in the last couple of years, a lot of water was wasted in the sea. Tamil Nadu insisted it wanted to build the dam to avoid further wastage of water.
2:32
He adds,"I appeal to the government to be sensible as the livelihood of many people depends on the decisions related to Cauvery River water."
2:33
2:34
Ranganathan further says that it is true Cauvery cannot satisfy the water requirement for all states and sustain agriculture, for the Supreme Court has decided that the availability of water should decide the type of crop.
2:37
He explains that it must be conveyed to farmers, that the amount of water available in Karnataka and Tamil Nadu is sufficient to practice the Double crop agriculture technique.
2:39
According to him, the Cauvery delta retains a magnificent water retention power compared to any other place in India.
2:40
Post securing of the water dispute act in Tamil Nadu's favour, it is necessary we follow proper norms while practicing agriculture in the Cauvery basin, adds Ranganathan.
2:41
He continues, "Sand mining is theft of sand. I appeal to the government to look into this issue and act on eradicating sand mining."
2:42
2:43
"Soil is excellent in the Cauvery delta and it can satisfy the food requirement in Tamil Nadu. However, the new delta will have commercial agriculture. It will focus on exporting pulses," explains Ranganathan.
2:44
Adding a positive note to the subject he says, "Our future farmers will be happy as it will improve their financial situation."
2:45
Ranganathan concludes with an inspiring line saying, "Let us ensure permanent food security by continuing farming practices that we are following today."
2:46
2:47
The Panel Chair, Venkatesh Athreya says, "There are three dimensions of food security - domestic production, biological utilization of food in your body and availability of access and absorption of food."
2:49
Elucidating on this issue, Athreya adds, "Over the years they claimed to have made some progress. We do have a large micro economy framework that is causing the current crisis in agriculture."
2:51
Taking the discussion forward, Dr Janakarajan says, "Interrogating Cauvery Calling is an appropriate and important issue. Jaggi Vasudev should have done a lot of research before getting into this project of planting trees all over the length of the river."
2:52
Shedding light on this matter, he mentions, Jaggi should've attempted to plant trees in the Western Ghats, which would've been political because extraction is done for industries.
2:53
Janakarajan adds, "Let's look at the middle part of the river. In Tamil Nadu, there are at least four major tributaries. They are all severely polluted."
2:54
"The dam constructed across the river has never been open for irrigation even once. It was commissioned in 1992 because it only collects polluted water," states Janakarajan.
2:55
He raises a pivotal question asking, "Cauvery, which is the source of many rivers, is being dumped with waste. How are we going to improve the health of the water? Cattle and people who use this water will fall sick."
Citing a striking example he says, "Even in the month of May, June the tributaries have water. But it is black water. On the other hand, if you look at the delta as a whole, the total length is 47000 km."
2:57
Jankarajan poses more such sharp questions. He adds, "Class A-H deltas. Do we have this today? We had 950 tonnes of water, where are they? They look like playgrounds today! What happened to the tanks in the Cauvery delta?"
He is also of the opinion that the Mettur dam has lost its capacity to 40 per cent because of silt accumulation.
2:59
He asks, "Why is it that we are not in a position to desilt the river bed? It has got an excellent sand deposit." He further states that food security is under severe threat because there's uncertainty.
3:00
Explaining his work he adds,"I used data from NASA and analysed it, to find out that more than 40 per cent of the land in delta is below the 5 metres level. Rest of the land is below 10 metres."
3:01
Addressing larger issues, he says that at the given rate of 3mm rise per year, Nagapattinam will go under sea level.
Highlighting this issue, he says, "So delta is under a very serious threat for several reasons. We've lost 4,000 acres of land because of erosion."
3:02
3:03
He is of the opinion that all these backwater canals attract sea water. Because of the rise in sea levels, water can engulf the land. In Chennai, water will rise over Adyar, Buckingham Canal. Pallikarnai marsh and IT area will disappear. The livelihood of food security in Cauvery delta is in danger because of extraction.
3:04
Summing up Jankarajan's points, Venkatesh Athreya says that planting trees on the cauvery Delta is not going to solve any problem.
3:05
Further, decentralisation policy is essentially a very large term.
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