New Delhi: The Supreme Court today (Sep 10, 2004) virtually lifted the stay on the controversial decision of two members of the Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal (CWDT) to visit the river basin as it refused to extend its interim order.

A Bench comprising Justice Ruma Pal and Justice Arun Kumar, after hearing a PIL challenging the decision of the tribunal members, said that the interim order of August 20 asking for deferment of the proposed visit would not continue.

The Bench reserved its verdict on the PIL filed Gandhi Sahitya Sangh Trust challenging the decision of the two members of the tribunal, who despite the objection of the Chairman of CWDT, had decided to visit the basin.

Appearing for the petitioner, senior advocate Ram Jethmalani said that it was unfortunate on the part of the two Members to suo motu decide to embark on the visit without hearing the parties, especially in the prevailing atmosphere at the Tribunal where there were ugly exchange of words between the Members and the Chairman.

Karnataka counsel G L Sanghi supported the petitioner and said that such conduct of the Members has led to the people losing confidence in the Tribunal and pleaded that its reconstitution should be ordered.

However, appearing for Tamil Nadu, senior advocate K K Venugopal termed the petitioner as proxy for the State of Karnataka and accused the latter of resorting to this method for adopting a delaying tactics to frustrate the efforts of the Tribunal to give an award on the water dispute.