Koppal: A drinking water crisis seems imminent in Bellary, Koppal and Hospet as water in Tungabhadra (TB) dam has reached the dead storage level as against its capacity of 133 TMC feet. 

Hospet will face an acute shortage of drinking water if there are no rains in the region before the second week of June. Official sources said the dam had 1.076 TMC feet of water on Wednesday against 1.084 TMC feet on the corresponding day last year.

 With no rain in the catchment areas, the inflow into the dam has been reduced to a trickle, leaving the officials concerned in a quandary as they have to release some water into irrigation canals in Koppal, Raichur, Bellary and three districts of Andhra Pradesh.

Farmers have expressed resentment over the fact that officials are ensuring continuous flow to the neighbouring state.

To add to the woes of officials, the storage capacity has dipped to 100 TMC feet due to accumulation of 33 TMC feet of silt in the dam.  Owing to the silt, an additional 33 TMC feet of water has been flowing to Andhra Pradesh as there are no balancing reservoirs to use this water. 

Though the previous BJP government had announced steps for removal of silt, it did not allocate funds for this purpose.