Telangana: Over 200 villages identified to be vulnerable for facing drinking water crisis in Asifabad, Adilabad

People are forced to trek long distances to collect drinking water from streams. While some of the residents are relying on open wells, some are forced to use bullock carts to get drinking water from wells situated in far off places

Santosh Padala: Kumram Bheem Asifabad/Adilabad: Even as the summer is setting in and temperature is soaring, people in remote forest areas of undivided Adilabad district have begun facing the water shortage.

In a majority of the villages in Adilabad and Asifabad districts, people are forced to trek long distances to collect drinking water from streams. While some of the residents are relying on open wells, some are forced to use bullock carts to get drinking water from wells situated in far off places.

---

Even as the problem seems to be intensifying, water supply authorities classified at least 235 villages as vulnerable for facing acute drinking water crisis in the ensuing summer. Hitherto, the villagers were covered entirely in Mission Bhagiratha, the flagship scheme of erastwhile BRS Government which supplied potable water through taps to every household.

The Mission Bhagiratha officials have now prepared an action plan to supply water while identifying the problematic villages. Officials say 147 villages were identified in Kumram Bheem Asifabad district alone. Kerameri mandal stood in the first place with 28 villages figuring in the list, followed by Tiryani and Jainoor mandals which had 20 villages each. At least 10 villages are going to witness the severe shortage of drinking water in Sirpur (U) and Wankidi mandals.

Nine villages in Asifabad and eight in Chintalamanepalli and six in Lingapur mandal were classified as vulnerable villages, five villages in Penchikalpet mandal were included in the list of the problematic villages. A whopping 76 villages in Sirpur (U) subdivision are likely to be affected by the drinking water crisis, while 51 vulnerable villages were from Asifabad subdivision of the drinking water scheme.

Officials said that they were planning to supply drinking water to these villages by hiring tractors every day as an alternative source. For instance, vulnerable villages in Kerameri mandal will get 36,520 liters per capita daily with the help of the tractors. They stated that funds were not sought from the government to address the challenge.

Meanwhile, Adilabad district accounted for 88 critical villages. As many as 24 villages in Gadiguda mandal were identified to be vulnerable for drinking water crisis, while Gadiguda mandal has 16 villages. Eleven villages each in Adilabad Rural, Bazarhathnoor and Indervelli were branded as the critical villages. Narnoor and Sirikonda mandals have eight and seven villages, respectively.

Officials of the Mission Bhagiratha said that proposals were submitted to the government in order to mitigate the crisis by creating drinking water sources at an estimated cost of Rs 3.07 crore. They stated that drinking water would be provided to the crisis-hit villages by drawing water from open wells and pump sets and by temporarily laying pipelines.