COIMBATORE: Residents of
eight Siruvani water fed municipal wards and the city municipal
corporation in charge of water supply can finally breathe a sigh of
relief after Kerala and Tamil Nadu
government arrived at a consensus regarding the sharing of water from
Siruvani reservoir above its dead storage level. Due to the low level of
water in the reservoir, the corporation would have availed water from
it only till May 15. But now, the Kerala government has sanctioned the
Tamil Nadu Water Supply and Drainage Board to draw 40 cusecs (100mld)
from the reservoir. However, as per the agreement, the TWAD board will
have to pump the water from the reservoir and a team of officials is
expected to conduct an inspection of the reservoir for this purpose
along with their Kerala counterparts on Tuesday.

“TWAD
officials will make necessary arrangements to ensure water is made
available as per the decision taken at the interstate meeting,” said KV
Ramalingam, state PWD minister when contacted on Monday evening.

TWAD board officials said they would first explore the possibility of
desilting a supply channel to make more water available from the
resevoir where the level stands at 860.8m. However, the officials will
have to finalise on the aspects of pumping the excess water permitted
from the reservoir only after inspecting the site.

“It is a reserve forest area and we have to be careful of various regulations in the matter. We will be able to confirm only after the inspection,” said a TWAD board official.

“We have agreed to share water from the Siruvani and now the necessary
arrangements have to be made from Tamil Nadu to draw the water from the
reservoir,” said P Lathika, chief engineer, Kerala PWD.

The
city municipal corporation is solely dependant on Siruvani reservoir to
supply water to eight wards where the supply lines are not interlinked
with Pillur scheme. These wards were supplied with 28mld of Siruvani
water as on Monday. However, corporation officials are expected to tread
carefully, maintaining the water supply from Siruvani till the arrival
of monsoon, claimed officials.

“As of now we are able to manage
water supply to the Siruvani water fed areas without major issues. We
will wait and see before making any major changes in the present water
supply cycle,” said a senior corporation official.

Localities
in the eight Siruvani dependant wards include e Telungupalayam, Priya
Nagar, Meenakshi Nagar, Raja Samy Colony, Selvapuram North Housing Unit,
Thiagaraja New Street 1,2,3, Lingappa Chetty Street, No 1,2,3, and
Sukrawarpet.