KOCHI: Even as the Mullaperiyar dam completes 125 years of lease agreement on October 26, lives of several people living downstream are still in limbo. The dam is capable of washing away three districts, including the Kochi city, if it collapses.The lease agreement was signed between the King of Tranvancore and the Britishers in 1886. In a mass demonstration, the activist of Mullaperiyar Samara Samithi and the people living downstream burnt copies of the agreement last week. They believe that the 1886 agreement and the one signed later by the state government in 1970 are unfair to them. Samithi chairman C P Roy said that the deal gave the British the right to divert “all the waters” of the Mullaperiyar and its catchments to the Madras Presidency for 99 years. After Independence, both the entities became non-existent. “According to Indian Independence Act 1947, all treaties between the British and princely states were null,” Roy said.He said that none of the state governments was ready to revise the agreement signed in 1970, disregarding the earlier understanding that it should be reviewed and revised after a period of 30 years. He alleged that even in 1970, the Kerala side accepted all the conditions as they were in the pact of 1886. “Our government should have put some condition before the Tamil Nadu in 1970 in terms of the authority of the dam. Instead, the government signed the pact which was similar to the 1886 lease agreement,” Roy added. With the Samithi celebrating its fifth anniversary in December, it is planning to hold protest programmes including representatives from Tamil Nadu too. People from various fields will protest against the lethargic attitude of both the governments. “It is now up to the Supreme Court to decide whether the dam should be replaced by a new one or the current status be maintained. We have only demanded that the concerns of the people who face life-threatening danger from the dam should be addressed, and decision be taken to save their life,” Roy said.
Comments
0 comment