Fundamentalism and the Sikh Religious Tradition by T.N. Madan

8.5 lakh shallow tubewells to irrigate 55 lakh acres of Barani land. Another unfortunate
fact is that tubewell irrigation is about 5 to 15 times more expensive than canal irrigation.
Besides, the maintaining cost is extremely heavy, since each year the pumping sets have
to be lowered because of the receding water table.
On the other hand, the final allottment by the Eradi Tribunal is :
Punjab
: 5 MAF.
Haryana
: 3.83 MAF.
Rajasthan
: 8.6 MAF.
Jammu & Kashmir
: 0.65 MAF
Delhi
: 0.2 MAF
The broad ratio of allotment is the same as that in the Indira Gandhi award of
1976. Among allottees except Punjab, and Jammu and Kashmir, the remaining areas are
non-riparian.
In addition, Haryana stands allotted 5.6 MAF of entire Jamuna waters of old
Punjab on grounds of its being in the Ganga-Jamuna basis, a principle the application of
which has been consistently denied to Punjab despite persistent requests of the State that
the issue should be adjudicated upon by the Constitutional Bench of the Supreme Court
of India.
(iii) Supreme Court V/s Tribunal : As stated already, Punjab's demand has
always been to refer the constitutional issue to the Supreme Court, and not to a Tribunal.
For, the real issue was the constitutionality of the Punjab Reorganisation Act, which
matter Supreme Court alone could adjudicate upon, and which the Tribunal could not
decide, because its jurisdiction related only to cases of inter-state rivers, which Punjab
rivers are not. Thus, a Tribunal was not competent to pronounce a judgement about the
vires of the Punjab Reorganisation Act or about the waters of a state river. But the Centre
consistently sidetracked this constitutional demand, and ultimately after the Bluestar and
Woodrose attacks, succeeded in entering into the Rajiv-Longowal Accord involving
reference of the water issue to a Tribunal and not to the Supreme Court. The irony of the
fact is that the Dharam Yudh Morcha which was started with the prime objective that the
SYL Canal, a post-reorganisation scheme, should not be constructed, ended with the
Accord under which the Centre was able to secure both its aims, first of having the
acceptance of the SYL Canal and that it would be completed within ten months of the
accord, and, second, of the water issue not being referred to the Supreme Court, and
instead, being placed before a Government Tribunal, even though the Punjab rivers were
not inter state, and Section 2 of the Inter-state Water Dispute Act gave jurisdiction to the
tribunal only regarding inter-state rivers. But Madan who is anxious to call the Sikhs
Fundamentalists for making the demands, remains completely silent about these
significant matters, demands, and the issues involved in the so-called Rajiv-Longowal
Accord, which evidently was a complete victory for the Centre, and a surrender for the
Akalis.
(iv) Dismal Future of Tubewell Irrigation: According to Government estimates,
each shallow tubewell irrigates, on an average, about 8 acres of land. As those tubewells
also supplement canals for assured irrigation, and assuming that they give only 4 acre feet
of water for the paddy wheat rotation, the total draw of water by the 8.5 lakh tubewells
comes to over 27 MAF per annum. According to the Punjab Government White Paper,
the available ground water each year is only 3 MAF. This means that the annual