Bengaluru: With the Cauvery basin districts facing a rain deficit, Karnataka will not be able to ensure the normal outflow of water to neighbouring Tamil Nadu this year.
After a meeting with officials and engineers of the water resources department on Friday, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah directed them to draw up a water management plan for the coming days and instructed them to ensure judicious use of water.
They have been told to launch an awareness drive in the Cauvery catchment area advising farmers not to grow water intensive crops like paddy and sugarcane and shift to non-water intensive crops.
Water will be preserved for drinking purposes and will not be diverted for agriculture. Since Bengaluru, Mysuru and Mandya needs drinking water, the CM instructed officials to preserve the available water for drining needs.
Addressing mediapersons after the meeting, Water Resources Minister M.B. Patil said that compared to the previous year, the storage of water in four reservoirs in the Cauvery basin has drastically decreased.
The total availability in these reservoirs is 62 tmcft compared to 115 tmcft last year. Sources in the water resources department told Deccan Chronicle that Karnataka needs 32 tmcft water to meet the drinking needs of Bengaluru city, Mysuru and Mandya town. Due to acute scarcity, water won’t be released for the sugarcane and paddy crop in the Cauvery and Tungabhadra basin.
Distress formula
The state government will request the Centre to prevail upon Tamil Nadu to adopt the distress formula this year, since the catchment area has not received normal rainfall. “By December 2016, Karnataka has to release 125tmcft of water, we hope Tamil Nadu will understand the reality and co-operate with us”, Mr Patil said.
In three months from June to August, Karnataka has released 21 tmcft of water to Tamil Nadu as against the required 34 tmcft. Considering the scanty availability of water in reservoirs, the state government will convey its difficulty in releasing the stipulated water to Tamil Nadu to the Centre Water Commission, Mr Patil said. The government has also decided not to conduct cloud seeding as it requires four months of preparation.
