Bandh brings Karnataka to its knees; Bengaluru shut

Karnataka ground to a halt on Friday, with a bandh call protesting against the Supreme Court’s order to release Cauvery water to neighbouring Tamil Nadu receiving State-wide support.

In Bengaluru, the bandh forced software multinationals such as IBM, Cisco, Infosys and Wipro to either shut shut down or wind down operations at several of their centres as public transport to ferry employees remained unavailable. Railway stations and the city’s airport were teeming with people as travellers made alternative arrangements to reach their destinations ahead of time.

Commercial establishments like banks, petrol bunks, malls and eating places remain shut with few volunteers opening food camps to help needy.

Phone-based cab aggregators Ola and Uber too ran skeletal services. State transport buses remained off the road, and metro rail services were suspended.

Although the bandh was largely peaceful, there stray cases of violence were reported from the Cauvery basin districts of Mandya, Mysuru, Chamarajanagar, Hassan and Ramanagara.

Normal life remained paralysed at all district headquarters as public transport remained inoperational. The Mumbai-Karnataka and Hyderabad-Karnataka regions and coastal districts supported the bandh.

Farmers in the Mandya and Mysuru districts intensified their agitation as the State government increased water flow to Tamil Nadu from the Krishnaraja Sagar and Kabini reservoirs.

State police chief Om Prakash said his forces had to lob tear gas shells and lathi-charge a 600-strong mob that attempted to lay siege to the KRS reservoir in Mandya district.

Cinema theatres remained shut as the operators extended support to the bandh call. Few cine and TV serial actors also backed the shutdown by joining agitators in Bengaluru, Mysuru and Mandya.

Police deployed over 65,000 personnel and officers across the State to maintain peace.

State Home Minister G Parameshwara told reporters that periodic monitoring and review of law and order was being carried out.

To handle the fallout of Supreme Court order to release Cauvery water, 10 companies of Central forces, two each from neighbouring Kerala and Andhra Pradesh, and one from Maharashtra have been summoned.

Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah has requested Prime Minister Narendra Modi to convene a meeting of Chief Minsters of Cauvery basin States to resolve the impasse “as unrest in Karnataka will create a serious impact on the economy”.

“I invite attention to a precedent of December 1995 where under similar circumstances of deficit flows the Supreme Court by order dated December 28, 1995, requested the Prime Minister to resolve the issue of implementation of the order of the Supreme Court; which was then duly done to the satisfaction of all parties,” Siddaramaiah said in a letter, the third such in less than a month.

Siddaramaiah said the unrest if continued would not only have a serious impact on the economy of the State particularly IT economy which bring enormous revenue and foreign exchange to the country but would also impact the livelihood of the common man adversely in the large parts of the State.

“However, as constitutional Chief Executive of the State I have taken it upon myself to obey the orders of the Supreme Court and the water are being released as per the order which has created more unrest and disquiet in the State,” chief minister explained.