New Delhi: The Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance government at the Centre could base the “scheme” it has to come up with to distribute Cauvery waters on the Bhakra Beas Management Board. It will take the form of an “authority with a mix of both administrators as well as technocrats”, said the official quoted above, as opposed to the recommendations by the Cauvery Water Dispute Tribunal which had proposed a board run by technocrats.

The decision, according to the official, was taken a day after the Supreme Court granted the ministry of water resources the “flexibility” to formulate the scheme in “consonance with the law’’ (section 6A of the Inter-State Water Disputes Act, 1956).

“We have been granted flexibility by the court to formulate the scheme,” said the senior ministry of water resources official cited above who asked not to be named.

“We had asked for two clarifications — whether the ministry had flexibility to form the scheme for distribution of the waters, and whether the board was to be set up according to the tribunal’s recommendations or we could change its administrative composition,’’ the official added.

The distribution of Cauvery waters is a festering one between Karnataka and Tamil Nadu.

On February 16, the Supreme Court ruled on the case, based on appeals by the states to the 2007 order of the Cauvery Water Dispute Tribunal, which also recommended the board. The SC order reduced the quantity of water Karnataka was asked to supply to Tamil Nadu by 14.75 tmc and was largely seen as fair. However, Karnataka, where elections are due on May 12 and which suffered a severe drought in 2017, isn’t keen on it. Tamil Nadu wants the order to be implemented.