File photo of the Mullaperiyar dam
The Tamil Nadu government today began work on increasing the Mullaperiyar dam level to 142 feet as per the orders of the Supreme Court, with a 12-member team taking up shutter renovation work.
As the first step, efforts would be taken to operate the shutters manually as well as power motors. The work would take one week to complete, sources said.
The Supreme Court had, on May 7, struck down a law promulgated by the Kerala government declaring Mullaperiyar dam as endangered and restrained it from obstructing Tamil Nadu government to raise the water level.
The court had held that the dam was safe and allowed the Tamil Nadu government to raise the water-level to 142 feet and ultimately to 152 feet after completion of strengthening measures on the dam.
Tamil Nadu and Kerala have for long been at loggerheads over the dam safety issue. While Tamil Nadu contended that the dam was safe and its water-level had to be raised, Kerala had maintained that the structure was weak and needed to be replaced.
The dam is situated in Thekkady District in Kerala and is owned and operated by the Tamil Nadu.