NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Wednesday refused to defer hearing on the contentious Sutlej Yamuna Link (SYL) canal issue beyond the Punjab polls and said it would not tolerate flouting of its decree directing Punjab to construct the canal.A bench of Justices PC Ghose and Amitava Roy was clear that impending elections could not stall the process in the SC, that is adjudication of cases irrespective of their importance. The bench told the Punjab government, represented by senior advocates Ram Jethmalani and RS Suri, that it would not tolerate flouting of its orders."The decree passed by the court for construction of the SYL canal must be given effect to, regardless of which political party comes to power," the bench said. The state goes to polls on February 4 and politicians, irrespective of party lines, have made a strong pitch for not permitting more water to be given to other states. The bench posted the matter for hearing on February 15.The court had repeatedly ruled and passed a decree in 2003 asking Punjab to construct its portion of the canal to ensure that Haryana got its share of Ravi-Beas waters from the Bhakra Dam Management Committee . Instead of complying, Punjab passed a law terminating its agreement with various states for sharing the Ravi-Beas waters in 2004.The court last year termed this law unconstitutional.However, the Punjab assembly passed another law denotifying the land acquired for construction of the SYL canal and started returning the land to the original owners. This was noticed by the SC during hearing of the presidential reference on the constitutional validity of the law relating to termination of water sharing pacts.The apex court had ordered status quo and had appointed a receiver for the land. On Wednesday, the Union government through solicitor general Ranjit Kumar informed the bench that as long as the law allowing return of land stood, SYL canal could not be constructed. The SC asked Haryana to respond to this.Dealing with Haryana government's contempt petition against Punjab, the bench said, "We will not allow decree of this court to be flouted in any manner. It is up to you (Punjab) how you give effect to our decree."