Rivers drying up, crisis grips Bagalkot

Hubballi: People of Bagalkot district are suffering acute scarcity of drinking water with all three major rivers they depend on for their supply, drying up.

The country’s third biggest river,  Krishna  flows through the district, but this has made no difference to the current situation and there is worse to come. Officials have warned the people could be in for a hard time  from April as the groundwater table  is falling sharply.

The Ghataprabha, the main source of water for Bagalkot, Mudhol and several parts of Gadag district, has dried up as has the Malaprabha river, forcing the people of Badami taluk and Guledgudd town to depend on the fluoride contaminated water of borewells. The soaring temperature has dried up the Almatti dam as well. It has a mere 20 tmcft of water left , and 14 tmcft of dead storage.  Worse, officials say over 6 tmcft of water will be lost due to evaporation by the end of June this year. With not enough barrages to store water from the three rivers when they are in full flow in Bagalkot district, the people of Bilagi, Jamkhandi and Mudhol taluk too are facing a severe shortage of water.

Sadly, the administration has failed to supply water through tankers except in some localities of Bagalkot. But  deputy commissioner P A Meghannavar says contingency plans are being made to draw water from private sources and  use of water for irrigation has been banned . "Belagavi regional commissioner has written  to the Maharashtra government for  release of water into the Krishna and we are drilling more borewells to meet the water needs of the people,” he said.