Click to play videoNew Delhi: The revered Cauvery is roughly 800 kilometers long and is the lifeline of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, also irrigating parts of Kerala and Puducherry.
It feeds approximately 80 lakh farmers in both the states and supplies water to over two and a half crore people including Bangalore.
"The water in the river has not increased, but the people in the Karnataka, Mysore area have increased, their number has gone up by many times and similarly in Tamil Nadu also the demand has become more," says senior advocate of Supreme Court K N Bhat.
So, there simply isn't enough water for everyone. Fair distribution of the Cauvery waters has been talked about as the solution, but here's the problem— Karnataka and Tamil Nadu cannot quite agree on what's fair.
Karnataka says Tamil Nadu doesn't need so much water, because unlike Karnataka, the Cauvery delta has large groundwater reserves. Also, there is no need to cultivate three crops in this region, especially the Kuruvai crop which depends completely on the Cauvery and not on the rains.
Tamil Nadu says stick to the 1892 and 1924 agreements and that Karnataka is cultivating more land than it should.
Obviously, when it rains heavily there's plenty more water to share. But the rains are erratic. And that's caused 500 hearings and countless arguments in a case that's gone on for 17 long years.
"I believe the case will finally land up in the Supreme Court under Article 136 of the Constitution they can appeal by special leave," says senior advocate of the Supreme Court K K Venugopal.
There's pessimism on both sides of the divide, but the two major states agree that the final award will resolve the big issues, and help find a way to end this bitter dispute.
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