CHENNAI/AMARAVATI: With Chennai reeling from “acute drinking water crisis”, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister O Panneerselvam on Thursday knocked at the doors of his Andhra Pradesh counterpart N Chandrababu Naidu seeking 5 tmcft of water from Krishna river to ensure that the southern metropolis gets adequate water this summer.
Responding “positively” to the demands made by Mr Panneerselvam at a meeting at the temporary Secretariat of the Andhra Pradesh Government in Amaravati, Mr Naidu assured to release water to the neighbouring state, but also asked the former to exert pressure on upper riparian states like Maharashtra and Karnataka to release water downstream in Krishna.
Andhra also facing water crisis, Naidu tells O Panneerselvam
It is understood that Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh have decided on release of 2.5 tmcft water in the coming months, though an official release from the state government in Chennai was silent on the quantum of water to be released immediately. During the meeting that lasted for an hour, Mr Naidu told Mr Panneerselvam that AP was also facing water crisis due to deficient rainfall last year.
The Tamil Nadu Chief Minister told Mr Naidu that the storage level in four reservoirs that supply water to Chennai was just 1.504 tmcft, which is "very low and inadequate to meet the drinking water needs of the city."
Later, Mr Naidu said: "We will assess the water availability position here and take a decision on releasing more water as we have already released 1 TMC ft. We are also facing water shortage here."
Noting that Tamil Nadu did not receive any water from the Krishna River during 2015-2016 and got only 0.991 tmcft in 2016-2017, Mr Panneerselvam said the present flow of about 1,000 cusecs released from Kandaleru reservoir is "inadequate" given the water needs of Chennai.
"Hence, Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu requested the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh to step up the release of water from Kandaleru so that at least 5 TMC feet of water is realised by Tamil Nadu in coming months," the release issued in Chennai said. Though Tamil Nadu has released Rs 687 crores to Andhra Pradesh for common components of the Telugu Ganga Project, conceived in 1983, both states would meet and decide on the amount since there are differences.
During the meeting, Mr Naidu also asked Mr Panneerselvam to exert pressure on Maharashtra and Karnataka through the Union Government to release water downstream since reservoirs in AP are not full.
