Water issue: BBMB moves HC, accuses Punjab of forcibly taking over Nangal dam's operation
Water issue: BBMB moves HC, accuses Punjab of forcibly taking over Nangal dam's operation
Chandigarh, The Bhakra Beas Management Board has filed a plea in the Punjab and Haryana high court, alleging that Punjab has forcibly taken over the operation and regulation of the Nangal dam and Lohand Control Room water regulation offices through police and prevented the release of water to Haryana.
The action taken by Punjab is unconstitutional and illegal, according to the BBMB's plea in the court that has sought a direction to the state to forthwith remove its police force deployed "without any authority of law".
The Punjab government has maintained that it is already providing 4,000 cusecs of water to Haryana on "humanitarian" grounds and refused to give 4,500 cusecs more, claiming that the neighbouring state has already utilised its allocated share by March.
The BBMB's technical committee decided on April 23 that 8,500 cusecs of water would be given to Haryana.
On Saturday, another petition was filed in the court by advocate Ravinder Singh Dhull, alleging that the Punjab government has "illegally deployed" police at the BBMB Bhakra headworks and Lohand escape channel, flouting all constitutional duties.
Dhull said that apart from his and the BBMB's petitions, the court has received a similar plea on the issue from a Haryana gram panchayat.
He said the matter came up before the bench of Chief Justice Sheel Nagu on Monday. The pleas were clubbed and the matter was posted for further hearing on Tuesday, Dhull added.
According to the BBMB's petition, a decision was taken by its technical committee on April 23 regarding the release of 8,500 cusecs of water to Haryana, which has not been complied with so far because of the non-placement of the indent before the board due to an objection from the respondent state .
Of the 8,500 cusecs of water allocated for Haryana, 500 cusecs were to be released to Rajasthan and 496 cusecs to Delhi, the BBMB's plea says.
Punjab has not agreed to the decision to release any extra water beyond the 4,000 cusecs that have already been given to Haryana and the board, at a meeting on April 30, asked Haryana to place the indent directly before it, with copies to the Punjab and Rajasthan governments for revised releases.
It was also decided that Haryana will ensure the release of water to Rajasthan and Delhi, so as to resolve the drinking water crisis in the desert state and submit daily compliance reports to the BBMB, according to the petition.
However, Punjab had not agreed to this decision, the plea said.
According to the petition, Punjab has forcibly taken over the operation and regulation of the Nangal dam and Lohand Control Room water regulation offices through police and prevented the release of water to Haryana.
"This action of the State of Punjab is wholly unconstitutional and illegal and amounts to direct infringement/interference in statutory functioning of the board of the petitioner, which is performing a function of national importance, which is sovereign in nature," the plea says.
The BBMB has been consistently persuading the Punjab government to desist from impeding the implementation of its decision and not to indulge in extra-legal actions in preventing the flow of water as decided at the board's meeting, but the respondents have persisted with the use of force against statutory provisions.
"The supply of water to Haryana or for that matter to any of the partner states is a matter of lifeline of the state concerned and any forcible action, such as the one stated above, by any of the partner states in the functioning of the board would lead to anarchy and lawlessness by the state itself," according to the BBMB's plea.
In case of any disagreement or dissatisfaction of any of the partner states with the board's final resolution, the matter could only be agitated or raked up with the Centre, which is the final arbiter in accordance with the procedures laid down by the rules, the plea says.
The BBMB's petition further says that equitable distribution of water among the partner states is a matter of lifeline for a particular state "and no one can forcibly enforce its unilateral and whimsical decision through the use of force", which, if allowed to prevail, would lead to an anarchic situation.
The petition also says that Punjab's action severely impacts the human rights of the people of Haryana, Delhi and Rajasthan, besides having an environmental impact on the agrarian economy of these states.
"It goes without saying that the operation and regulation of the Nangal dam and Lohand Control Room water regulation offices is a matter of skilled job to be performed by professionals of the Bhakra dam establishment, and forcibly taking over the operational works by the police force of the State of Punjab could prove to be disastrous," the BBMB's plea says.
