Chandigarh: Haryana chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar and his Punjab counterpart Bhagwant Mann, are set to meet here on October 14 on the issue pertaining to the construction of the Sutlej-Yamuna Link (SYL) canal that has defied any solution for decades.
This meeting comes a month after the Supreme Court had asked the chief ministers of two states to discuss the issue pertaining to the construction of the SYL canal and resolve the 26-year-old dispute over the sharing of Ravi-Beas rivers water.
It was on September 6 last that the apex court had asked the two CMs to amicably resolve the vexed issue. A three-judge SC bench led by Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul had asked the Union Jal Shakti Ministry to call a meeting of the two CMs for the purpose and sought a report on the progress. The SC further fixed its next hearing in January 2023.
Stating that water was a natural resource and living beings must learn to share it - whether individuals or states, the bench said that the matter could not be looked at from the point of view of only one city or one state.
According to information, attorney general K K Venugopal had also said that Punjab was not cooperating in the matter and that the Centre had written a letter to the new chief minister in April, but there was no response.
Representing Punjab, advocate J S Chhabra had assured the apex court that it would cooperate in finding a negotiated settlement to the problem. Chhabra told the court that the state was keen on continuing with talks but the gap was due to Covid-19 and the farmers’ stir. He held that the new dispensation in the state was willing to cooperate, pointing out that since the court’s order of July 2020, the chief ministers met a month later to resolve the dispute.
Dispute over sharing river water:
It may be recalled that there has been a dispute between the two states over the issue since 1996. It was in 2002 that the Supreme Court had in a decree, ruled in favour of Haryana and directed Punjab to construct the SYL canal within a year. This decree came on a suit filed by Haryana in the year 1996.
In June 2004, the SC reiterated its earlier decision while dismissing a suit filed by Punjab seeking the discharge of its obligation to construct the SYL Canal.
It is pertinent to mention here that while Punjab has been demanding a reassessment of the Ravi-Beas rivers waters’ volume, Haryana has been seeking completion of the SYL canal to get its share of 3.5 million acre-feet of the river's waters.
