Not a single drop of additional water will be shared with any other state at any cost, Punjab chief minister Bhagwant Mann said on Thursday, a day after the Supreme Court asked the Centre to survey the land in Punjab allocated for the construction of a section of the Sutlej Yamuna Link (SYL) canal.

Mann’s remarks came after he convened an emergency meeting of the state cabinet at his residence. Though no official agenda of the meeting was released, the state cabinet discussed the SYL canal, a thorny issue between Punjab and Haryana for decades, said the CM.

“The issue of SYL was discussed in the meeting. Not even a single drop of additional water will be given to any other state at any cost,” Mann posted on X after the meeting.

While there was no immediate reaction to Mann’s response by Harayana authorities on Thursday, Haryana chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar, in a post on X on Wednesday, urged the Centre to “complete the survey work of the canal without any delay and work towards giving Haryana the rights that have been pending for years”.

The Punjab chief minister also said that convening the monsoon session of the state assembly soon was also discussed in the cabinet meeting. Though he did not indicate any dates, people familiar with the matter said the session could be called as early as next week.

The cabinet meeting was held against the backdrop of the apex court asking the Union government to actively pursue the mediation process in order to resolve the festering dispute between Punjab and Haryana over the construction of SYL canal.

A bench headed by justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul asked the Centre to survey the portion of the land in Punjab allocated for constructing the canal, which is locked in a protracted legal battle between the neighbouring states since 1990.

The SYL canal was proposed for the effective allocation of water from the Ravi and Beas rivers. The project envisaged a 214-km canal, of which a 122-km stretch was to be constructed in Punjab and the remaining 92 km in Haryana. Haryana completed the project in its territory in June 1980 but Punjab, which started the construction work in 1982, shelved it in 1990.

Punjab maintains that the quantum of water flowing through Ravi and Beas had dipped considerably and therefore, water volumes to be shared with lower riparian Haryana should be reassessed.

In 2002, the top court directed Punjab to complete the remaining portion of the canal within a year. In November 2016, it declared the Punjab Termination of Agreements Act. 2004, as “invalid”. The court’s verdict came in a 2004 presidential reference to examine the legality of the Act that scrapped all water-sharing agreements with neighbouring states.

Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader and Punjab’s finance minister Harpal Singh Cheema said the state government was yet to get a copy of the Supreme Court’s order.“Once the order copy is available, we will meet again to discuss it and decide the next course of action,” Cheema told reporters at the AAP’s state headquarters in Chandigarh.

On convening the monsoon session, he said that assembly speaker Kultar Singh Sandhwan was currently traveling and a decision on the matter will be taken after his return.