Need permanent tribunal to settle water disputes, says Jaitley

New Delhi: Terming the water disputes among states as "extremely sensitive", Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Saturday pitched for setting up a permanent tribunal for resolving such issues.

"I personally feel that we probably require a permanent tribunal rather than a tribunal which on and off takes up water dispute. So probably in a country like India, (we) require one tribunal which deals with all these disputes and also has some amount of expertise in the members of the tribunal," Jaitley said at an event here.

He was speaking at the launch of the book 'Inter-State River Water Disputes Act' by senior lawyer K K Lahiri.

"Water issues are not really legal; they have to be resolved legally in the inter-state water issues. But they are extremely sensitive and therefore once you initiate this water dispute, it's almost like the bifurcation of the state where it takes place," he said.

"In terms of election agenda, I think once you implement them, they raise very serious economic concerns, which then translates into political and emotional concerns. And nobody is willing to let go off water."

The Ganga River itself impacts the economy of 40 per cent of India's population, he added.

Jaitley said what at times appears to be an only legal dispute pending in courts, eventually end up impacting the lives of millions of people.

Citing the Narmada dam issue of the 1990s, he said once the construction was permitted, it changed the economy of the large part of Madhya Pradesh.

It ended the dry region of Kutch. It took that state to a double digit of agricultural growth, it ended the power problem, he said.

He also said that the fastest returns always come by irrigation as it starts giving benefit by as early as the next year.

"Therefore at the end of the day we need to use our entire resource and once we are able to give a comfort level to the agrarian community that its economic interests are not going to be impacted as its attachment to the water is almost as strong as its attachment to the land," Jaitley said.

The Finance Minister said that the book has given chapter wise historical evolution of the water related problem, the issues that stand and the vision for the future.