State Slowly Running Out Of Water, Both Above And Below Ground

Hyderabad:Telangana appears set to face a multifront and severe water supply crisis if the continued disappearing act being pulled by groundwater, and the slow but what seems like an inevitable fall in storages in surface water sources are anything to go by.

The coming months, which are expected to remain dry for most part with the northwest monsoon season too expected to give Telangana the go-by just as the southwest monsoon season did, will pose a serious challenge to the state, according to officials.

“Unless everyone steps up and starts using less water, from right now, things could turn dire as early as February,” an official said.

“At least we can see what is on the surface, in reservoirs, tanks and lakes. But there is no way of knowing what is happening to the ground water,” the official added.

The surface water situation is expected to turn precarious if whatever water is left is not used judiciously with the water levels falling in reservoirs, tanks and lakes with each passing day, according to officials.

For instance, the total storage in the 21,000 listed minor irrigation tanks in the state in the first week of October was 94.30 tmc ft according to irrigation department data. And with less than a week to go before October ends, the storage as on October 26 in MI tanks was just 36.8 tmc ft. In good times under good conditions, these MI tanks are capable of holding 253.80 tmc ft, as per the irrigation department.

As far as the major and medium reservoirs over Krishna and Godavari are concerned, on October 26 last year, they held a combined 812.36 tmc ft of water which this year, has fallen to 421.93 tmc ft. As far as reservoirs on Krishna are concerned, this year they have at present 293.47 tmc ft compared to 494 tmc ft on October 26, 2025. For Godavari basin reservoirs which had 275.44 tmc ft last October 26, that storage fell to 164.7 tmc ft this year.

According to agriculture minister Tummala Nageswara Rao, the ground water too has started disappearing at an alarming rate. Of the 30 lakh or so agricultural borewells in the state, six lakh have already gone dry, with another five to six lakh set to go the same way, the minister had said. Telangana, according to the Central Ground Water Board, has a density of around 27 borewells in every square kilometre. On an average, each borewell in the state provides irrigation to around three acres, with around 80 per cent of the cropped area dependent on borewell irrigation.

Meanwhile, the agriculture department estimates that by the end of November, as the Yasangi (Rabi) crop season gains momentum, the groundwater levels in every one of the 33 districts are set to fall from the state average of 7.52 metres below ground level (MGBL) at the end of September to 7.94 MGBL by the end of October, with November set to see further fall to 8.30 MGBL.