Team Herald
PANJIM: The joint inspection team comprising superintendent engineers of Goa, Karnataka and Maharashtra, constituted to inspect the Kalasa-Bhanduri project over Mhadei river, will now file separate reports about their findings after they failed to arrive at a consensus on Friday.
Superintending Engineers M K Prasad (Goa), Krishnoji Rao (Karnataka) and Vijay Kumar Thorat (Maharashtra) met for the second time at the inspection bungalow, Kankumbhi, Karnataka and also paid another visit to the Kalsa-Bhanduri project site. But the team failed to arrive at a consensus after Karnataka’s official refused to include observations made by Goa’s member.
The three-member joint monitoring team was constituted as per the directives of the Supreme Court to inspect the Kalsa-Bhanduri project site so as to ascertain whether there was diversion of Mhadei water into the Malaprabhra basin by the Karnataka. The court had also asked them to submit the report on April 5.
Accordingly all three States appointed their engineers of the Water Resources Department and the team visited the site on March 19 but could not finalise the report due to lack of time. They again met on March 23 where they decided to again visit the site due to disagreement between them while finalising the report.
WRD chief engineer Shrikant Patil said that the joint monitoring team has now decided to file separate reports as there was no unanimity among them following the inspection. “We will file our separate report before the Supreme Court on April 5,” he said.
On February 22, The Supreme Court bench comprising Justice D Y Chandrachud and Justice M R Shah while, hearing a contempt petition filed by the Goa government against Karnataka, had asked the three States to form a joint inspection committee to inspect the Kalasa project site to ascertain whether was diversion of Mhadei water and to submit the report within four weeks.
