Bengaluru, 3 May 

State Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Saturday said that the government will demand the Centre to issue a gazette notification for the award of the Krishna Water Disputes Tribunal-2, at a meeting called by the Union Jal Shakti Minister CR Patil next week.

This will facilitate the use of waters allocated to the state and allow for an increase in the height of the Almatti dam, Siddaramaiah added.

He said that the State government will assert in the meeting that it will raise the dam height to 524 meters as there is no interim order by the Supreme Court.

Jal Shakti Minister will chair a meeting on 7 May with water resources Ministers of Karnataka, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, and Telangana to discuss the report-cum-award of the Krishna Water Disputes Tribunal-2.

CM chaired a meeting with Deputy Chief Minister and Water Resources Minister DK Shivakumar, along with other Ministers, legal experts, and officials, to decide on the State government's stance.

Speaking to reporters after the consultation, he noted that he and Shivakumar had met the Central Minister regarding this matter.

"The Union Minister has now called a meeting, and in that meeting, we will demand that the notification be issued immediately. The second tribunal order allocated 173 TMC of water for use, and to store and utilise this amount of water, the dam height must be increased from 519 meters to 524 meters. For this, the gazette notification must happen," he said.

Shivakumar said an all-party meeting will be convened after the 7 May meeting with Patil. -