Thiruvananthapuram: Water shortage on cards

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Several areas at Nedumangadu has already started experiencing water scarcity despite a sumptuous South-West monsoon last year.
“Wells at the panchayats of Peringammala, Vithura, Panavoor, Pullampara, Vembayam, Kallara and Vamanapu-ram have started to dry up. The intensity of rains has nothing to do with water levels in our hilly areas as all of it runs down faster into Arabian sea. The watershed management programmes should have been at its peak last year,” said Aanad Jayan, Congress leader at District Panchayat.

New water projects in areas like Tholikkodu, Aanad, Pullampara areas at least two years from completion. Vamanapuram River, the primary water drinking water source has dried up early and pumping for small drinking water projects could not happen. Though several check dams were built on rivulets, their impact would be too small to avert a water crisis, he added. “Last year, by January second week we had run out of the water. This year, was no different. The Kallar has started to dry up already,” said Rohit N a resident of Tholikkodu.

The officials, as planned during last summer were planning to use portable plants filter to utilise water from abandoned granite quarries for drinking purpose. “A holistic survey of the tap-able cubic feet of water is yet to be done in several quarry ponds,” a Kerala Water Authority official said.