Telangana pins hope on Almatti dam for emergency releases

Almatti dam has still been left with some 25 tmc and only 7.7 tmc of it could be drawn from the reservoir and Karnataka may not be able to yield more than one or two TMC of it to meet the drinking water needs in Telangana

Hyderabad: With the threat of severe scarcity conditions looming large under the Krishna basin projects, a high level team from the State is likely to visit Bengaluru on a water mission soon. This is after the State government had earlier sounded Karnataka on the need for emergency releases from Almatti dam to support the drinking water supply in case of an emergency in the next two months.

The State government is likely to take a decision on the team’s visit in a day or two, officials said. The government had plans to seek about 30 tmc of water from Koyna dam located in Western Maharashtra. But the distance between the Koyna and the State projects including Jurala was more than 700 km and the net realisation from any releases conceded by Maharashtra could be far less.

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Seeking water from Koyna at this juncture cannot be considered a priority option, they felt. The Karnataka government released 2.75 tmc of water from Almatti reservoir to meet the drinking water needs in its own districts of Bagalkote and Kalburgi recently.

The Almatti dam has still been left with some 25 tmc and only 7.7 tmc of it could be drawn from the reservoir. Karnataka may not be able to yield more than one or two TMC of it to meet the drinking water needs in Telangana. Karnataka has already declared a crop holiday under its Narayanpur dam in the Krishna basin. The water crisis being faced in Bengaluru city, which in fact falls in Cauvery basin may not come in the way of sparing one or two TMC to meet the needs of Telangana districts which are well within the Krishna basin.

The Irrigation official exuded confidence that the situation could well be managed with the water available within the State projects.

If needed, some five to six tmc of water can be drawn from the Nagarjuna Sagar project going below the Minimum Draw Down Level (MDDL) of 510 ft. There were occasions when water from NSP was drawn reaching down to 506 feet. Besides this, the Yellampalli reservoir has about nine tmc of water as against the gross storage of 20.18 tmc. Prudent use of the water available within the State’s own reservoirs could help bail out the State from any sort of water crisis in May and June, they said.

“We have assured sources for adequate supplies during March and April,” they said adding that moves were afoot to meet the emergency needs of the State. Hyderabad would not face a Bengaluru kind of water crisis, they said.