City heading for water crisis

Drinking water crisis looms large over Hyderabad. The State Irrigation Department informed the Hyderabad Metropolitan Water Supply and Sewerage Board (HMWSSB) that water levels in Krishna reservoir are fast depleting. If the catchment areas under Krishna River do not receive rains in the next ten days, water supply will have to be stopped.

The Irrigation Department reports that reliability of the existing water resource from Nagarjunasagar reservoir was diminishing at an alarming rate. According to officials, this issue prominently figured during a review meeting chaired by Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao, recently.

“Water levels at Nagarjuna Sagar reservoir have fallen to 509 feet as against 547 feet same day last year, which is below the minimum draw down level (MDDL) of 510 feet,” the officials said. In view of this, the Chief Minister directed the officials to make alternate arrangements to save city from water shortage.

HMWSSB Operations Director G Rameshwar told The Hans India that the reservoirs in the city, Osmansagar and Himayatsagar, were drying up while Singur water levels were also falling. Officials report that the present water available in Osmansagar is about 0.046 TMC as against its capacity of 3.900 TMC.

Himayatsagar has only 0.415 TMC of water left as against 2.967 TMC capacity. The situation in Singur too is not encouraging. Presently, Singur has only 2.127 TMC of water as against its storage capacity of 29.917 TMC. From Singur about 120 MGD of water is being supplied through emergency pumping water from dead storage level.

By:Maddy Deekshith