Tamil Nadu members walk out of Mullaperiyar dam review meeting

MADURAI: Protesting against the forest department and public works department (PWD) of the Kerala government for not allowing them to carry out maintenance work at the Mullaperiyar dam site, two members of the sub-committee from Tamil Nadu, walked out of the review meeting held on Friday.
The five member sub-committee, led by executive engineer of the Central Water Commission (CWC) Saravanakumar, Tamil Nadu executive engineer (Mullaperiyar dam) J Sam Irwin, assistant engineer Kumar and the Kerala representatives executive engineer of the Kattapana Irrigation Project Harikumar and assistant executive engineer Praseeth, met for a review meeting at the dam site on Friday.
With the water level of the dam standing at 129.45ft, they inspected the dam, the main gallery and seepage conditions. However, the Tamil Nadu members walked out of the meeting after they were not allowed by the Kerala government to take materials inside the dam.
In a letter to the committee, the members stated that it was meaningless to continue the review meeting when they were not allowed to do their work by the Kerala authorities. They pointed out that though the supervisory committee had permitted maintenance works to be carried out in the dam’s site as per the Supreme Court’s orders.
“Just attending the meetings and finishing it after inspection of the dam was pointless, when work had to be done. Preventing us from doing our duty is a contempt of court,” they said in their letter.
As the members walked out, the meeting concluded in five minutes.