Cauvery dispute: Supreme Court agrees to hear Centre's plea on April 9

The Supreme Court today agreed to hear the central government's plea for clarification on the February 16 verdict regarding the setting up of a Cauvery Management Board in the decades-old river water sharing dispute.

"We will take this matter on April 9 along with the plea of Tamil Nadu," the bench of Chief Justice Dipak Misra and Justices AM Khanwilkar and DY Chandrachud said when the Centre's counsel Wasim Qadri sought urgent hearing of the plea.

The central government's counsel had referred to the divergent views of the concerned states on the issue of setting up of the scheme.

In its verdict, the top court had modified the Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal (CWDT) award of 2007 and made it clear that it will not extend time for this on any ground.

It had asked the Centre to formulate a scheme to ensure compliance of its 465-page judgement on the water-sharing dispute.

On February 16, the Supreme Court had raised the 270 tmcft share of Cauvery water for Karnataka by 14.75 tmcft and reduced Tamil Nadu's share while compensating it by allowing extraction of 10 tmcft groundwater from the river basin, saying the issue of drinking water has to be placed on a "higher pedestal".

With the top court's verdict, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Kerala and Union Territory of Puducherry would be annually entitled to 404.25 tmcft, 284.75 tmcft, 30 tmcft and 7 tmcft of Cauvery water respectively out of the total of 740 tmcft.

(With inputs from PTI)