The Hindu              04.05.2013

Yield from drinking water sources continues to fall

Supply to Tiruchirapalli has come down by 16 MLD.

The combined yield from five of the six drinking water
pumping stations on the Cauvery riverbed has dipped by about 24 million
litres a day (MLD) owing to the continuing drought like situation,
causing problems in filling up the overhead tanks (OHT) that supply
water to different parts of the city over the past 15 days.

The
five additional borewells sunk recently by the Tiruchirapalli City
Corporation on the riverbed at Kambarasampettai had helped tide over the
situation to a certain extent by yielding about 8.36 MLD. Currently,
the city was being supplied about 82 MLD against the normal of 98 MLD.

Steps
were being taken to provide supply to the severely affected and
tail-end areas of the distribution mains areas through tankers and
sinking additional borewells locally. Efforts were also on to supply
water to 23 OHTs up to Ponmalaipatti from the new drinking water
augmentation scheme within the next couple of weeks. However, if the
yield from the water sources in the Cauvery bed continued to fall over
the next fortnight, the Corporation will be forced to go in for
alternative days supply for residents in the city. This was crux of the
presentations made by civic officials at a special consultative meeting
with Corporation councillors convened by Mayor A.Jaya to discuss the
drinking water supply situation in the city on Friday.

Councillors,
cutting across party lines, complained that the OHTs in their
respective wards were not filling up, resulting in short supply. Even
the old municipal areas which were getting abundant twice-a-day supply
were now getting water supply for hardly 30 minutes a day. Water
supplied through tankers proved inadequate in many parts of the city,
they said.

Responding to the complaints, Corporation
Commissioner V.P. Thandapani said the yield from all the water schemes
on the Cauvery river, except the Srirangam water scheme, has fallen
drastically. Sixteen of the deep borewells around the collector wells on
the riverbed have failed and the yield from the 30 others was coming
down too. However, the collector wells are pumping water round-the-clock
even without the usual rest of two to three hours a day. Daily supply
was being given to all except six of the 65 wards in the city.

Within
the next couple of weeks, the flushing operation on the pumping mains
from the Collector Well 3 of the new drinking water scheme will be
completed and water would be supplied to 23 OHTs up to Ponmalaipatti.
This will greatly help tide over the situation. Borewells will be sunk
wherever necessary. So far 428 complaints have been received over the
toll free numbers set up in the Corporation and 411 complaints were
solved immediately.

Mr.Thandapani directed assistant
commissioners and assistant executive engineers to inspect and assess
the problems pointed out by the councillors this weekend and come up
with plans of action to sort out the same.

R.Chandran,
Executive Engineer, said the drinking water shortage owing to the
drought like conditions was reminiscent of similar situations faced by
the city in 2001 and 2004. But the steps taken by the Corporation in
anticipation of the problem has helped manage the situation so far. “If
the situation continued for another 15 days, the civic body may to have
think of taking recourse to introducing water supply on alternative days
in the city,” he said. However, steps were being taken to provide
supply through alternative measures to the worst affected wards, he
said.