Adding fuel to the ongoing Mahanadi dispute, Minister Damodar Rout on Tuesday questioned why the Odisha Government has no information on projects
built on the upper catchments of the river.
He also demanded action against the autonomous body which looks after the Hirakud Dam reservoir for having no information on the projects built in Chhattisgarh.
“Being a lower catchment basin, how could Odisha not know about the constructions in upper catchmentsIJ What were they (the autonomous body) doingIJ They should be taken into task and action should be initiated against them,” Rout told reporters here.
Rout, a BJD vice-president, also said protests
against a vital issue like Mahanadi concerning the State’s interests should be unanimous.
The statement of the senior leader assumed significance at a time when the BJD rejected leader of Opposition Narasingha Mishra’s invitation to the party supremo and Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik to attend an all-party meeting being convened by him on Wednesday on the Mahanadi issue.