Normal life in the city and most parts of the state was affected on Friday by the dawn-to-dusk Karnataka bandh called by pro-Kannada outfits, to protest against the Supreme Court’s direction to release Cauvery water to Tamil Nadu.
Advertisement
“The shutdown is in protest against the Supreme Court’s order and to express resentment over the government releasing the Cauvery water when we don’t have it for drinking and irrigation”, said a strike leader, Vatal Nagaraj. With political parties also supporting the day-long shutdown, security has been stepped up and additional forces have been deployed across the state to maintain law and order.
Similarly, factories, offices, banks, markets, shops, malls, hotels, eateries, pubs, bars, theatres and petrol bunks have closed in support of the shutdown. While essential services have been exempted from the shut down, passengers alighting from flights at the Bengaluru International Airport and various railway stations in the city were put to severe hardship due lack of adequate public transport.
Chief Minister Siddaramiah had appealed for peace and said no damage should be caused to public property during the bandh.
Karnataka state cable TV operators association has also made a decision to not air Tamil TV channels in the state on Friday.
Though government offices are open, the attendance have taken a toll, owing to the lack of transport.
“It is the lawful duty of the Centre to resolve the Cauvery issue between Karnataka and Tamil Nadu”.
This is Karnataka’s second bandh in a week and the fourth one this year. While maintaining that the release was “inevitable”, Karnataka government has said it would seek modification of the apex court’s September five order to spare water for 10 days because of the difficulties in implementing it given that the live storage in four reservoirs in the Cauvery basin now was 46.7 TMCFT against their capacity of 104 TMCFT.
IMetro remains closed during Karnataka wide strike called to protest against release of Cauvery river water to Tamil Nadu on Sept 9, 2016.
Advertisement
Mr. Eshwarappa took a dig at the Chief Minister Siddaramaiah for his alleged volte face on continuance of senior counsel F.S. Nariman representing Karnataka in the Supreme Court. “It is very hard to live without the water of Cauvery”.
