Let Cauvery Be

Deforestation, urbanisation, illegal mining and dumping of effluents along the river has left the basin battered and bruised. Decades of degradation has led to an unprecedented crisis for the 15 million who live on its banks.

Jitendra travels along the course of one of India’s biggest rivers to understand why its level hit a record low this year

- Jitendra

MOVE ON, AND live long, Oh Cauvery!” For some 15 million people living on the banks of this river and its 21 tributaries, the ode by Prince Ilango Adigal in the Tamil epic Silappadikaram is the mantra of life. More so, because barely a trickle now remains in the 805-km river that flows through Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. There’s not more than knee-deep water in Talakaveri, the source of the river in Karnataka’s Kodagu district. The water here is so still that it has turned green with algae. It is mindboggling how this is possible in the Western Ghats, one of India’s highest rainfall zones.

Last year, the Cauvery basin received 4 percent above normal rainfall. By August, all the dams were overflowing and soon both the states were drowning in floods. This year, the two states are reeling under a severe and unprecedented water crisis. In Kodagu, every lane is dotted with water tankers. Water crisis forced schools to extend their summer vacation in Dakshina Kannada and Udupi districts of Karnataka. In a locality in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, residents complained that sewage water was flowing out of hand pumps, the only source of water in their area. The situation forced the Cauvery River Management Water Board to ask the Karnataka government to release water to Tamil Nadu.

Monsoon broke in Karnataka a week late, on June 8 this year. The drying riverbed hoped to be agush with water. The season has completed half its cycle but registered 46 percent deficit rainfall. A reprieve for the river seems unlikely. “The river stagnates every year in May. This year, it stopped flowing in March itself. I have never seen such a miserable state of the Cauvery,” says 57-year-old Choomi Puvaya, a big farmer WHO owns 35 hectares (HA) in different parts of Khardigone village in Kodagu.