My Mudumalai Experience - Feb 13-22

After months and months of waiting, I am finally in the field. I'll try to provide an update of what I see each day that day itself. But getting here was an ordeal in itself. I was supposed to leave Bangalore last week, but because of the Cauvery River situation, my travel had to be delayed since Mudumalai National Park is in Tamil Nadu.

Monday, February 12 was the all Karnataka bandh, when nothing would be running. One of the options was to leave Bangalore on Tuesday morning, by the KSRTC bus, at 10 a.m. which would get me to Mudumalai by around 4 p.m. or so. But in the event that there was trouble in Mandya, a very volatile region about 40 kms before Mysore on the route to Mudumalai, the bus would be delayed and it would be dark by the time I reached the forest. Since it was my first time coming here, I didn't want to land here in the dark.

The other option was to leave Bangalore on Monday night by the train which would take me to Coimbatore from where I would have to take a bus to Ooty and then another bus down to Mudumalai. This would be an extremely circuitous trip which would result in 12 hour plus journey from Bangalore to Mudumalai.

So I decided to go to Mysore and stay in my cousin's house on Sunday night and then leave Mysore on Tuesday morning. I left Bangalore on Sunday evening by the 6 p.m. train and reached Mysore a little after 9 p.m. I waited out the bandh in Mysore on Monday in my cousin's house and left by the 9 a.m. bus on Tuesday. I was here at the field station in Masinagudi by 11:45 a.m.

Masinagudi is a small village enclave surrounded by the national park on all sides. At 960 meters above sea level, the weather is almost identical to the weather in Bangalore although it is slightly drier. To the south, I can see the Nilgiris hills rising another 1500 meters above my current elevation. Its now about mid-February and typical February weather at this elevation means hot days and chilly nights. Generally, high temps reach about 32-33 degrees during the day and drop to 16-17 degrees at night.

View of the Nilgiris from the front porch

Anyway, let me get to the wildlife now:

Chital (spotted deer) - I first spotted these animals on the bus soon after we entered the park limits and I've seen them on every excursion out into the forest since then.

On my first excursion, we left the field station at about 3:30 p.m. on Feb 13. As soon as we got onto the interior forest roads, we came across some langurs hopping from tree to tree. A little later on, we stumbled on a large herd of elephants. Unfortunately for us, they were downwind of us and smelled us. As soon as we came into view, they retreated into the cover. We spent more than 90 minutes in the area waiting for them to come out into the open but the wind kept shifting and they kept getting our scent (elephants have very poor eyesight, pretty good hearing, and an excellent sense of smell). The researcher who I was going with climbed some trees to get some views of the elephants and he said it was a large herd with some 10-15 animals, including calves. We only got to get a good look at about three of them though.

Elephants that we spotted on the forest road

One of the elephants that we got a better look at

Ari on the tree trying to spot elephants

We waited around until 6:30 p.m. after which it got too dark to take any discernable photographs and left the scene. Before we left the scene, at around 6 p.m. we were waiting in the forest surrounded by thick cover on both sides. To our left, we could hear the elephants rustling and to our right we heard a langur give an alarm call, subsequent to which a tiger called. Unfortunately, we couldn't see anything because of the cover, which as you can imagine was extremely frustrating.

Now I've been talking about the cover. Mudumalai National Park has a sharp rainfall gradient. The westernmost part receives more than 1700 mm of rainfall annually and is moist evergreen rainforest. The central and west central portions receive 900-1300 mm of rainfall annually and are mainly dry deciduous forest. The easternmost portion of the park lies in a rain shadow area and receives only about 600 mm of rainfall annually is dry thorn and scrub forest. On the afternoon of Feb 13, we were mainly in the west-central portion of the forest, in the dry deciduous habitat.

This habitat used to be covered with deciduous trees (shedding their leaves in the dry season) and grasses, which elephants feed on. In the years of 2001 and 2002, there was a severe drought which resulted in one particular weed taking over. The years following this saw heavy rainfall which caused this weed to die out but then another weed, lantana, took over. This lantana is what is predominant now. An exotic species, lantana grows to a height of more than 2 meters (~6.56 feet) and is very, very thick growth. It suppresses light and causes the grass to die out. Elephants do not eat lantana and find it somewhat difficult to navigate through. The ecological implications of the lantana explosion need to be determined in the coming years. A year or two of lesser than average rainfall (but not drought) will definitely curtail the lantana, since it needs a lot of water, while not allowing the drought-favoring weed to take over either. But anyway, because of this cover, it has made researchers' job a lot tougher.

Note the thick lantana cover on the shore of the watering hole

The grass still covers some stretches of the forest; at one time, much of the forest used to look like this

And now it looks like this, with the lantana explosion

By the way, tigers seem to love the lantana since they now have an amazing cover to stalk their prey. Lantana's effect on herbivores and tigers is another interesting topic to potentially explore. Anyway, in addition to the elephants, on my first excursion, I also saw a peacock, some other birds, and two mongooses crossing the road.

On the morning of February 14, we headed out into the scrub forest at around 8:00 a.m. This forest is an entire world different from where we were yesterday. Lantana was gone, but so were the tall trees and grasses. Some dry grasses were present, lots of stunted trees, as well as plenty of cacti. Yes, you heard me right, cacti. We had a very exciting morning in the scrub forest. We first saw a group of black bucks, part of a very small population in this park, and one came and went right across the road when the jeep was stopped. After this, we came across some more langurs, chital and then saw two black naped hares on separate occasions as they crossed the road. We were going along the Moyar River trying to catch elephants as they headed for a drink in the morning. Multiple times, we came across fresh dung and figured we had missed the elephants on some occasions by a matter of hours and on other occasions by a matter of minutes. My colleague got a phone call on one occasion and stopped the jeep and turned it off. While he was talking on his cell phone, a big male gaur (Indian bison) came out of the scrub jungle onto the road about 100 meters in front of us. With the jeep off, he must not have heard us. Gaur are extremely shy and though I moved quickly for my camera, he crossed the road and into the scrub before I could take a shot.

Further along, we saw some sambar deer as well, also an elusive, shy species. So basically, it was a good morning. We saw everything that resides there except leopard, elephant and sloth bear. Tigers do not prefer the scrub forest since there isn't much cover for them there.

We went back along the Moyar River around noon to try and see if we could see some elephants and again we saw dung. It's now almost 4 p.m. on Feb 14 and we are planning to go back to the same region of the forest later this evening at about 5 p.m., when we should have a fairly good chance of spotting the elephants along the river.

Note the cacti in this dry thorn forest; they were introduced by the British when there was a famine here early this century

A view of the dry thorn forest

Black buck on the road

Sambar deer

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I'm not going to write about what I saw each and every time I head out into the field since that would be too much trouble for me to write and for you to read. I'll just restrict myself to anything I happen to see which needs to be commented upon or if I do something out of the ordinary. Regarding the evening of February 14, I went out to the village of Moyar on the eastern edge of the sanctuary where one of my colleagues wanted to buy some farm fresh vegetables. Unfortunately, the farmer usually doesn't get customers on his farm and he didn't have a balance with him to weigh, so we couldn't get any. But let me talk a little bit of Moyar village. It is a prosperous farming village (the villagers seem quite well off, relative to farmers in other villages I've seen at least). Though in a rain shadow area surrounded by scrub jungle (the village receives less than 700 mm of rainfall annually), irrigation from the Moyar River keeps the fields green. But the main thing about the village is the breathtaking scenery. Land from Moyar drops gently down until it rises sharply to meet the Nilgiris, which run east to west as far as the eye can see. And in the soft orange glow of a cool February evening, you might as well be in paradise.

Moyar village, breathtakingly beautiful scenery here. The green, irrigated fields are backed up by the forest, which are further backed up by the Nilgiris which run east to west as far as the eye can see

Anyway, while going to Moyar, we saw a herd of elephants, including two calves, but since we were directly opposite the light, we couldn't get any good photographs. While returning from Moyar, we saw a big tusker on the opposite side of the irrigation canal. We approached on foot (since there was a water body separating us, we were safe). He saw me, tried to retreat into the forest, but couldn't because there was a steep cliff right behind him. He quickly spun around and adopted a threatening posture, curling his trunk inwards and kicking the earth with his leg. He then realized that I couldn't get to him because of the canal and started walking across the canal. In the meantime, someone motioned to an elephant crossing the canal using a bridge about 50 meters from us, so we walked back to the jeep. The fading light of the evening (it was past 6:30 p.m. when I saw the tusker and the sun had set almost half an hour ago) prevented us from getting any good close ups of the animals on the road.

Tusker we spotted on the way back from Moyar

On the morning of February 15, I went up to Ooty to get my research permit from the Wildlife Warden, whose office is there. Ooty is about 30-odd kilometers from where I am staying and the easiest way to get there is by the Kallatty-Sigur Road. This is one of the steepest roads I've gone on. It consists of 36 hairpin bends, where in a distance of about 12 kilometers you rise about 1.2 kilometers. So for every kilometer you travel, you're going up by 100 meters. That's phenomenal! I am staying at an elevation of 960 meters above sea level and Ooty is at an elevation of 2200 meters above sea level. The train station at Ooty (Udagamandalam is the full, tamil name of the town) is the highest station in south India and may be the highest train station in India. I have to check on this when I get back to Bangalore. On the way back down, I took some photographs on hairpin bends 3 and 15, which are among the best views. Hairpin bend 3 is at an elevation of about 2000 meters above sea level and hairpin bend 15 is at an elevation of about 1700 meters above sea level.

Ooty train station, 2203.247 meters above sea level

I met the wildlife warden for Mudumalai, who is interested in my project, which looks at elephant-traffic interactions within the sanctuary. He said he was particularly interested in my project since there is increasing pressure to widen the highway within the sanctuary and so far he has been able to oppose it. If it were to be scientifically found that existing traffic is disturbing elephants within the sanctuary, it would be able to help his case against expansion. As anywhere, construction and road widening under the name of "development" is big bucks in India. A significant portion of the money is embezzled by contractors, politicians, and innumerable other sources. It's amazing, as you drive down from Ooty and leave the last hairpin bend, the road is a smooth two lane highway through the Singara Reserve Forest. As soon as you enter the Mudumalai Wildlife Sanctuary, it becomes a one and a half lane, bumpy road. Again, entering Masinagudi village limits, it becomes a two lane highway. Leaving the village, it goes back to the narrower lane. The one and a half lane highway ensures that when two cars traveling in opposite directions come across each other, they must both slow down and have to go offroad a little to pass by each other. It also deters motorists from traveling through the sanctuary and use other roads. Proponents of the widening argue that road widening will bring economic development and animals such as elephants and deer will have no issue in crossing the road. Well, that's what I will be looking at in the next few months. Exactly how does the road impact elephants?

Anyway, on the way up to Ooty, I learned a great deal of the Indian Civil Services from my colleague. To be in the Civil Services, IAS (Indian Administrative Services), IPS (Indian Police Services), and IFS (Indian Forest Services), you have to take the respective exams after graduation. In these highly competitive exams, those who make it within the 40th rank get to choose the state of their posting (and many choose their home state). After the 40th rank, the officers are assigned on an alphabetical basis based on their name as well as the alphabetical order of the states. So thus, I pity the person who ends up serving in a state such as Bihar. These postings are lifetime postings, with the exception of 5 years which a person may serve under the Central Government in New Delhi.

I'm going to take the example of the wildlife warden of Mudumalai to describe how this works. Let's say that this person was assigned / chose Tamil Nadu as his posting. He usually serves for roughly 10 years at the division level. The division level would include something such as Mudumalai Wildlife Sanctuary and National Park Division, or Singara Reserve Forest Division (just south of Mudumalai on the Ooty road), etc. In his 10 years at the division level, an officer usually serves in about three divisions, staying in each place for about 3-4 years. They may be adjacent divisions or they may be in opposite corners of the state.

After 10 years, the officer would be promoted to Circle level. Mudumalai comes under the Coimbatore Circle, which also includes Singara Division, Coimbatore North Division, Anaimalai Wildlife Sanctuary Division, etc. Again, in this time, the officer usually serves at least in two circles, probably three.

After about 10 years at the circle level, the officer is promoted to the State level where in the case of Tamil Nadu, they would be posted to Madras where they would serve posts such as Chief Wildlife Warden or Principal Chief Conservator of Forests. Combined with five years deputed at the Central Government, this includes roughly 35 years of service. Since most people usually join the civil services only by the age of 26-27, roughly 35 years of service translates into retirement at 61-62 years age. As you can see, the Indian Civil Services is very hierarchical and very structured. The alphabetically based posting ensures that anyone from any state can be posted to any state, which I personally think does a great deal for national integrity. I've met two civil services officers so far, one in the IAS and the other from the IFS, and both are from Uttar Pradesh and have been posted to Tamil Nadu.

They have been bound to another corner of the country for a lifetime and in this time, they will certainly absorb a lot of this very different culture here as well as give a lot. And as I discussed at a class at Drexel, compared to places like Africa, India has done a lot, lot, lot better job in conserving its wildlife and natural environment. African countries complain about overpopulation, but India's population density is about ten times that of Africa as a whole. Even taking the vast emptiness of the Sahara into account, India has a lot more people in a lot less area. We were trying to think of reasons for this and we eventually decided upon a combination of a culture that respects nature as well as political will (that great savior of Indian wildlife, late-Prime Minister Indira Gandhi), but more so on a very structured and codified civil services, which is very competitive and attracts the most dedicated. It is this, backbone of Indian government that has kept it from degenerating into a banana country like so many other countries in Asia and Africa.

And no, this post is not to suck up to any particular officer in the Indian administration. I really do appreciate the civil services, despite all their numerous faults (major egos, bureaucratic red tape, etc).

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The day before I came back to Bangalore for the weekend, I had some good luck in the field. In the morning, I witnessed a forest fire. Unlike in North America, there are no natural forest fires in India. Every single fire has been lit by man and there are dozens of these in Mudumalai alone annually. Some are small and some are large. I thought the one I witnessed was large, but the locals tell me that it was actually pretty small compared to some that get lit deep in the forest. This one happened right next to the road and was spotted immediately by the Forest Department.

Anyway, I asked my tracker why the villagers light these fires. Apparently sometimes it's in an attempt to catch deer within the burning lantana bushes or grasslands so that the antlers can be poached at a later time. EDIT 08/11/07: I've also heard that ever since the forest department started suppressing fires starting a decade ago, tribal villagers light them clandestinely because they believe that fires are good for the forest. As for whether they actually are, the jury is out. Personally, I would think that since these fires have been happening for hundreds, perhaps thousands, of years, the ecosystem would have adapted to them by now.

Anyway, what I was really shocked about was seeing the forest department staff handle the fire. They had none of the safety equipment or fire fighting equipment common in the West. No flame retardant clothing, no fire fighting sprays, no helicopter backup, nothing which would be even the minimum in the developed world. Instead, they were in their cotton clothes, near flames that sometimes leaped up the branches of trees, trying to beat the fire down with bushes. And no, there is no concept of hazard pay in India either. For this life threatening, tedious labor in the hot midday sun, they make 80 rupees per day, which works out to roughly $1.78. It really goes to show that when you have one billion people, the value of a single human life really does not exist.

Fire in the forest

Forest department fire-fighter

Later on that evening, I saw my first complete elephant group. They came up to the road, looked around, saw no traffic and crossed, making sure the calves were safe beneath their feet. I saw the same behavior in humans yesterday crossing the road in Bangalore where all the children were safely within the group. This is why I love elephants, my favorite animal. To repeat my oft-mentioned statement, they are like humans, without the evil.

Elephant crossing

Anyway, I'm back to Mudumalai tonight and I will be there for three to four weeks. So expect the next blog posting then.

Really Exciting Weather

The weather in the middle latitudes so far this winter has been exciting to say the least. Let's take a look at some places:

United States east of the Great Plains: After an unusually warm November, December and the first half of January, winter came back with a vengeance. First, let's rewind to the warm weather. November, December, and the first half of January were very, very, very warm. Temperatures crossed 20 degrees Celsius in Philadelphia on 7 days in November (including on the last day), 2 days in December and a day in January (topping out at 22 degrees on January 6, a record high for that date).

It even led weather speculators in the media to contemplate the chances of a snow-free winter, saying that if Central Park were to go through winter without seeing a single flurry, it would be the first time it happened in 150 years of record keeping. In Philadelphia, I noticed trees blooming across Drexel's campus in December and I wouldn't blame them. The phrase on everyone's mind was "global warming."

Then once in late January and again in early February, the jet stream dipped south and a massive blast of Arctic air came down from central Canada onto the U.S. mainland. Philly saw the mercury fall to -12 degrees on January 26 in the first Arctic blast, warm briefly, and then plummet again to -12 degrees on February 5 and 6 and -11 degrees on February 7. This time, the warm up is going to be a lot slower than last time (today's low is expected to be -9 degrees and tomorrow's and the day after's low will be -8 degrees). Compare that to average lows around this time of year of around -3 degrees, we're talking 5 to 10 degrees below average. By the way, the wind chill made it seem like -20 degrees in Philly in the past few days (am I glad I'm currently in Bangalore where the day time highs are around 29 degrees and night time lows around 16 degrees).

Chicago meanwhile saw its coldest day in 10 years when the mercury dropped to -20 degrees or lower on February 3, 4, 5 with the coldest night (Feb 5) seeing a low of -23 degrees Celsius. I can only imagine what the wind chill must have been over there (probably somewhere close to -30 degrees or so).

Anyway, this very unusual winter pattern (prolonged unseasonably warm weather followed by a massive Arctic blast) has created quite a volatile combination in the Great Lakes region. Normally, moderate cold waves pass over the Great Lakes in late November and December, causing Lakes Erie and Ontario to freeze over gradually and causing moderate lake effect snow on the lake shores of Ohio and New York. When the truly Arctic blasts come in January and February, the lakes are usually mostly frozen over.

This year, the lakes had no ice on them through the middle of January. When the Arctic blasts came, the cold, dry polar air readily absorbed moisture from the relatively warm lake surface as a dry sponge would. When this reached the other side, this has resulted in staggering amounts of lake effect snow, particularly in New York state off Lake Ontario (I guess because Lake Erie is shallower and more of it would have frozen in the first Arctic wave in late January).

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17042993/?GT1=9033

Parts of New York have received up to 60 inches (~150 cm) of snow in as little as 24 hours with snow sometimes falling at the rate of 5 inches (12.7 cm) per hour. The event is not all said and done yet, but some places are expected to break the 100 inch (254 cm) mark before the proverbial fat lady sings.

While people have readily associated the warmer months with potential climate change, not many would associate these Arctic blasts with global warming. But they may be associated after all. One of the theories regarding global warming suggests a slight increase in temperatures but with a greater number of extremes.

For example, consider Anytown, America. In a normal winter (90 days), Anytown, America sees low temperatures of 20 days below -10 degrees Celsius, 50 days between -10 degrees Celsius and 0 degrees Celsius, and 20 days with low temperatures greater than 0 degrees Celsius. The average low temperature for winter is -5 degrees Celsius.

According to this theory of climate change, the average low temperature would shift by some amount like 2 degrees warmer to -3 degrees Celsius, but you would see something like 30 days with low temperatures below -10 degrees Celsius, 40 days above 0 degrees Celsius and 20 days with low temperatures between -10 degrees Celsius and 0 degrees Celsius. It's a scenario where extremes of cold and warm dominate with what used to be considered "normal" hardly being seen anymore.

It is of course one of many theories of what could happen and events of the winter of 2006-07 seem to go along with this. But next winter could follow a completely different theory. I'm not even saying that current weather is an indication of climate change, since I only have detailed knowledge of what's going on in the eastern United States. All I'm saying is that even this cold snap could be a consequence of climate change, according to one of the theories. I'll leave it up to the climate scientists to calculate average global temperature and count the cost of severe / freakish weather.

Speaking of freakish weather, here's what happened elsewhere in the world, briefly:

United States Rockies and West: While the eastern two-thirds of the country basked in unseasonably warm weather for much of November, December and the first half of January, the west shivered. In December, Los Angeles saw low temperatures approach the freezing mark, San Francisco saw a few snow flurries, and Denver saw snow storm after snow storm wallop it.

And January in California has been more or less seasonal as far as California, but it has been unusually dry. This is strange because 1) it is the rainy season. Also 2) some people have proposed that this is an El Nino year, which explains the warm conditions across much of the U.S. This could be true, but El Nino years are usually unusually wet for California, while much to the contrary, it has been unusually dry.

Europe: Europe was unusually warm through much of December and January, leading to a feverish crescendo over there to do something on climate change. Then in the third week of January (a few days after I passed through London on my way back to India), England was hit by a massive storm that created gale force winds across the island tearing down trees and roofs, canceling flights from airports, and battering the coasts with massive waves.

Subsequent to this, England seems to be hit by a freakish snow storm. An unexpected storm combined with some unusually cold air seems to have provided a wide swath of snow about 100 miles wide stretching diagonally down from northwestern Wales through southeastern England. Many major English cities have seen about 4 inches of snow (~10 cm) and portions of England could top 6 inches (~15 cm). While this number seems minuscule compared to what's happening in upstate New York, we have to remember that England usually doesn't get snow and even if it does, it's no more than a light dusting. The English are woefully unprepared to handle even a very modest snowfall such as this and this latest bout of freak weather is causing a lot of headaches on the other side of the Atlantic as well.

Meanwhile, Moscow had to cancel its ice festival this winter since the weather was too warm and the ice was melting away. In January, when Moscow usually averages about -9 degrees Celsius in January, Moscow saw high temperatures above freezing for the first 22 days of January, topping out at 8 degrees on January 11, about 14 degrees above average.

Asia: In Beijing, cherry trees are currently blooming. Beijing only saw one day in January when the high temperature dropped below the freezing mark (the average high temperature for January) and topped out at 8 degrees on January 17 and January 29. Unlike in Europe and North America, February has not seen a return to normal yet in China. Temperatures reached 12 degrees on February 3 and 13 degrees on February 6. Over the next ten days, temperatures are expected to cross the 10 degree mark on 5 days. The average high in Beijing for this time of year is 3 degrees. Temperatures are expected to cross that mark on every single one of the next ten days.

I wish I had as much detailed information about the rest of the world as I do about the eastern U.S. Somewhat worrying, but at least no one can complain that the weather has been dull, not even England, perhaps the home of monotonous weather.

Water, water everywhere, not a drop to irrigate?

It seems that every time this city moves towards normalcy and sets its sights on prosperity, a monkey wrench is inevitably thrown in the process. Today, it is the much awaited final verdict of the Cauvery River Tribunal, which after 17 years of deliberations has said that of the average of roughly 730 tmc (thousand million cubic feet, or billion cubic feet, which is what I will refer to it henceforth as) of the annual Cauvery River flow, Tamil Nadu deserves 419 billion cubic feet, Karnataka 270 billion cubic feet, Kerala 30 billion cubic feet and Pondicherry 7 billion cubic feet.

When this first broke out on television, I was stunned. Karnataka was under an interim order by the Tribunal issued in 1991 and was required to release 205 billion cubic feet of water. The final verdict more than doubled the amount of water that Karnataka was required to release, which amounts to 57 percent of all Cauvery River water! Shortly after that, sporadic violence broke out across the city, schools and businesses closed early and bus services between the two states were canceled, and tires and the occasional vehicle bearing Tamil Nadu registration was burnt. Anticipating violence like the major anti-Tamil riots of 1991 (when the interim verdict was issued), the state government had ramped up security across the city which has thus far kept violence to a minimum.

Meanwhile as this whole situation was unraveling itself, more details emerged. The 730 billion cubic feet is the ENTIRE flow of the Cauvery River and the 419 billion cubic feet that is Tamil Nadu's share is part of that ENTIRE flow, which includes rain that falls within Tamil Nadu as well as groundwater recharge of the river in Tamil Nadu. The amount of water that Karnataka is supposed to release to Tamil Nadu from its reservoirs is 192 billion cubic feet, which is in fact lesser than the 205 billion cubic feet that it is currently releasing as per the interim 1991 order. But due to the media's hasty actions, the damage had been done. The magical number of 419 billion cubic feet was out there and being circulated amongst the agitating farmers and the masses on the streets of southern Karnataka (although much of the Karnataka share is used to irrigate land in southern Karnataka, more than 500 million liters per day is pumped more than 100 kilometers to quench Bangalore's thirst (~60% of Bangalore's daily water needs)).

Because of the media's hastiness in announcing this verdict without having the details in full, the politicians in Karnataka were forced to express "shock and disappointment" with the verdict. Thus we had the unusual situation where the politicians in Karnataka are promising to appeal the verdict while the lawyers that represented Karnataka before the tribunal hailed the verdict and said the Tribunal had done a "tremendous job."

So what is the actual situation? Of the 730 billion cubic feet of water that is the Cauvery's annual flow, about 475 billion cubic feet falls within Karnataka. Of this, Karnataka is required to release 192 billion cubic feet of water to Tamil Nadu, or about 40% of Karnataka's annual catch. Of the 192 billion cubic feet that Tamil Nadu receives, it is supposed to let 10 billion cubic feet flow to the sea for "environmental reasons" which probably includes the health of the diverse aquatic riparian ecosystem in the Cauvery River delta.

Tamil Nadu has ended up a winner here, however. It was widely expected that Tamil Nadu would receive no more than 300 billion cubic feet of water total and no more than 75-100 billion cubic feet from the Karnataka side. 419 billion cubic feet is certainly a victory for Tamil Nadu and Karnataka farmers have a right to be sore.

The main problem is that Tamil Nadu is downstream of Karnataka and they receive their monsoon rains later. The rainfall in the catchment areas of the Cauvery River in the Western Ghats mountains of Coorg district occur mainly June through September. During this time, Cauvery water is flowing downstream to Tamil Nadu which farmers in the Cauvery delta utilize. In addition to this, Tamil Nadu receives its annual monsoon rains in the months of October through January. So in effect, Tamil Nadu farmers will have a continuous supply of water from June through January, or two thirds of the year. In addition, being a lowland state, Tamil Nadu has ample groundwater reserves that farmers up in the Deccan Plateau here in Karnataka do not have.

There have been allegations that the decision by the Tribunal was politically motivated (The ruling party of Tamil Nadu is also a part of the coalition running the Central Government in New Delhi. The ruling party in Karnataka on the other hand is in opposition in New Delhi), I do not think this is the case. In fact, until yesterday, the Tamil Nadu government was expecting the verdict to go in Karnataka's favor and was blaming the former Tamil Nadu government for changing lawyers too often during the Tribunal review process. I do think however that the verdict is not fair to the people of Karnataka and Karnataka should appeal the verdict. If the Tribunal rejects Karnataka's appeal as well, the only recourse is for Karnataka to appeal to the Supreme Court. If the Supreme Court should reject the state's stand as well, we should abide by the terms and conditions and move on. A release of 192 billion cubic feet is not the worst scenario Karnataka could be facing.

Also, the Tribunal needs to articulate specifically what needs to be done in "distress years." When the monsoons have been good, 192 billion cubic feet is not a problem. But when there is a drought like in 2001 through 2003, that figure is impossible to achieve. The Tribunal has said that in distress years, the water release should be lowered "proportionately." It needs to expand on that and set strict limits of what water Tamil Nadu is entitled to demand in years of scarcity.

Most importantly, let's remember that since the Cauvery River Tribunal was first convened in 1990, the population of Bangalore has more than doubled and the populations of both states have increased at a rapid pace. But the annual flow of the Cauvery is still 740 billion cubic feet. Conservation needs to be emphasized and agricultural practices have to be improved. The Israelis have learned to grow crops in the desert, water can certainly be better managed here.