Alarm bells ring for Hyderabad water supply

Telangana left with only 7 tmc in Nagarjuna Sagar for meeting drinking water supply in next six months.

Hyderabad: The dipping water levels in Nagarjuna Sagar Dam have set the alarm bells ringing for the Hyderabad water supply.

With Andhra Pradesh completing the drawl of five tmc of water for its needs just two days ago as approved by the KRMB, the project was left with only 18 tmc of water above the minimum drawdown level (MDDL) of 510, feet.

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Out of this, the Telangana state would have a share of only 7 tmc to meet its drinking water needs in the twin cities of Hyderabad and Secunderabad besides the districts of Nalgonda and Khammam.

Hyderabad requires 1.6 tmc in a month to meet the drinking water requirements of residents of the State capital and its suburban municipalities, along with other towns in the command area.

The drinking water supply requirement has to be supported by all means for at least another six more months i.e., February to July. Krishna river basin projects are known for their late arrival of inflows.

The state’s share of the water available in the present storage of the project will last only till the first half of May.

Even if, the State government had planned to seek some 10 tmc of water from Karnataka and 30 tmc from Koyna dam in western Maharashtra, the proposals have not materialised so far.

Both States of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh had initially agreed to restrict their utilisation of water drawn from the Nagarjuna Sagar Dam exclusively to meet the drinking water needs, but AP did not stick to the commitment so far. Much of the last spell of water releases given for AP were diverted for meeting the irrigation needs, according to Irrigation officials.

It will be an uphill task to take water from the Nagarjuna Sagar project once the water level touched down to the MDDL level of 510 ft. An approach canal has to be dug to draw water from the project by gravity to meet the irrigation needs, they added.