Water crisis stares at Greater Hyd

Hyderabad: Telangana is staring at drinking water crisis as water levels in all reservoirs under Krishna and Godavari basins depleting fast.

Greater Hyderabad is already reeling under water crisis with the water levels plummeting in Singur, Himayatsagar and Osmansagar reservoirs from where water is lifted to meet the drinking needs of Hyderabad and its surrounding areas.

Water levels at Srisailam under Krishna basin has reached below minimum draw down level (MDDL) of 815 feet in Srisailam reservoir.

On Friday, it has been reported water levels have gone down to 808.5 feet in Srisailam having only 33 tmc feet of water in the reserve.

The full reservior level (FRL) of the project is 885 feet with a total capacity of 215 tmc ft.

Water storage in Nagarjunasagar reservoir also reduced to 511 feet as against 590 feet FRL.

The available water in the project is only 133 tmc feet out of 312 tmc feet gross capacity. The MDDL of the Sagar project is 500 feet.

With no flows from the upper riparian state of Karnataka, water levels in Jurala and Tungabhadra under Krishna basin has gone to 1.93 tmc feet out of 9.67 total capacity and 3.34 tmc feet out of 100 tmc feet capacity of the projects respectively.

Officials said that the availability of water in Srisailam and Sagar could meet the drinking needs of Hyderabad and Nalgonda for a few days.

As water level in Srisailam has gone down to below MDDL, the possibility of drawing water is ruled out from the project.

The only option before the two states to meet drinking water needs is the storage available in Sagar.

The Krishna River Management Board (KRMB) has recently instructed the two states to maintain MDDL at 500 feet in Sagar. Water levels already gone down to 513 feet.

A total of 650 mgd (million gallons per day) is required to meet the drinking water requirement in Hyderabad alone.

With the water levels hit the rock bottom in Krishna basin, the TS governments could meet less than 50 per cent of the water requirement in the ensuing peak summer in May this year.

Water availability in Godavari basin was also on the decline. Water reserves in the reservoirs fell down to 208 tmc feet out of the installed gross capacity of 779 tmc feet (including Jaikwadi) in Godavari basin.

Water levels in Singur reservoir, which is main source fetch drinking water needs in Hyderabad, has been reduced to 0.77 tmc feet out of the total capacity of 30 tmc feet.

Nizamsagar, Sriramsagar, Lower Manair Dam, Kaddam and Sripada Yellampalli reservoirs under Godavari basin were also drying up fast with the depletion of water levels.

Water availability in these reservoirs are reported be 20 per cent of the total capacity.

As a result, drinking water crisis is looming large in north Telangana districts of Nizamabad, Warangal and Karimnagar and Godavari districts in Andhra Pradesh next month.

Officials said that the KRMB is closely monitoring water levels in reservoirs of Krishna.

Based on the availability of water, the board will finalise water allocation to Telangana for drinking purpose.