New Delhi (Sputnik) — India’s technology hub Bengaluru has witnessed massive riots in the wake of India’s Supreme Court decision not to suspend an order which directed the south Indian state of Karnataka to provide water to neighboring Tamil Nadu.
இப்போ அனுபவிங்க #DismissKarnatakaGovt #cauveryissue pic.twitter.com/oWSw0v4KnF
— தமிழன் நெஸ்டர் (@mascojaya) September 13, 2016
On Monday, a man named Umesh died when police fired upon protesters who were attempting to torch a police vehicle in Karnataka. A second person succumbed to injuries a day after falling from third floor of a building while trying to escape a police raid on Monday.
Politicians including the Prime Minister have appealed to people to stay calm and help resolve the issue peacefully.
I appeal to the people of the two States, to display sensitivity, and also keep in mind their civic responsibilities: PM @narendramodi
— PMO India (@PMOIndia) September 13, 2016
The Cauvery River has been a bone of contention between Karnataka and Tamil Nadu for more than a century, and both the states had witnessed violence over who gets access to its water on many occasions in the past. Twenty-eight people were killed in 1991 when hundreds of families of Tamil origin were forced to flee Karnataka in fear after a tribunal asked Karnataka to release the Cauvery’s waters to Tamil Nadu.
“With widespread damage to vital urban infrastructure, as well as interruptions in transport including roads, rail and air and the inability of the workforce to safely move to and from offices and factories, Karnataka, particularly Bengaluru city, is estimated to have suffered a loss of up to 3.7 billion USD due to Cauvery dispute related-violence. Violence in the state capital and other parts of Karnataka has severely dented the image of Bengaluru as the Silicon Valley of India, and home to almost all of the Fortune 500 companies,” says ASSOCHAM, India’s leading industry body on Tuesday.
Karnataka and Tamil Nadu are two of India's top industrial states. Bengaluru, formerly known as Bangalore, is the capital of Karnataka and is a major business center for large Indian and Multinational companies such as Infosys, Wipro, Accenture, Dell, Amazon, Mphasis, Ola, and Flipkart.
