Civic body bleeds more for power in Tirupati

Tirupati: As the Kalyani dam, one of the two major water sources for supply of drinking water to the pilgrim city, completely dried up, the Municipal Corporation of Tirupati (MCT) is now left with no choice but heavily depend on Telugu Ganga scheme for water supply to the city.

Corporation sources said that the monthly total power charges towards electricity consumption for pumping water steeply increased to Rs 1.2 crore now as against Rs 80 lakh.

Telugu Ganga scheme originating from Kandaleru-Poondi (KP) Canal near Srikalahasti, 35 km away from Tirupati, requires pumping at six stages for bringing water to the city from the canal to meet the drinking water requirement of the pilgrim city.

The corporation water supply department is taking up pumping round-the-clock, to draw 50 Million Litres per Day (MLD) for water supply to the pilgrim city against its requirement of 60 MLD to fulfil the water requirement of the city.

The six places where the water is pumped to lift the water include KP Canal, Ramapuram, MD Puttur outside the city and Mangalam, Leelamahal area and municipal park on Tirumala bypass road within the city limits.

The corporation is drawing on an average about 45 MLD water from KP Canal of Telugu Ganga Water Supply Scheme to meet the city water requirements including TTD to which the corporation is providing 8 MLD to meet its water requirements including Tirumala for pilgrims, its establishments in Tirupati down the hills, about 3 MLD to Renigunta town, govt hospitals, educational institutions including Sri Venkateswara University (SVU), leaving only 35 MLD to the residents, who are feeling the pinch of water scarcity.

MCT has no choice but drastically cut down the water supply to the residents, who are now getting water once in three days which was earlier alternate days. Till recently, Kalyani dam was providing about 10 MLD water helping the corporation reducing the drawing of water from KP Canal which in turn enabled it to consume less power as the water from Kalyani dam reaches the city through pipeline on gravity requiring no pumping.

A senior corporation official revealed that the power charges will remain high till rains to bring water to Kalyani dam. "As water is essential service, the corporation is ready to spend for electricity charges to ensure at least minimum water supply to the city," he added.

It may be noted here that apart from the monthly power bill of the corporation and amount of Rs 12 crore is payable to the contractor for pumping water for 100 days from the dead storage of Kandaleru dam into KP Canal at Kandaleru in Nellore district for water supply to Tirupati.

It is needless to say that due to continuous dry spell, groundwater level dipped resulting in most of the private bores in Tirupati city dried up, leading to most of the residences solely depending on the water supplied by the corporation which is virtually struggling to cope with severe water crisis in the city.