Drinking Water Crisis to Hit Rayalaseema Project

Anantapur: The irrigation department is blamed for the  poor allocations from Tungabhadra Reservoir and Krishna backwaters of Srisailam to the Handri Neeva Sujala Sravanthi project, which is causing a panic situation in Rayalaseema region.

The drinking water scenario is particularly worse in Anantapur, Satya Sai and parts of Kurnool and Chittoor districts.

In view of the rain deficit, experts say this will cause a drinking water crisis till the onset of the next southwest monsoon season. The reservoirs and storage points are at dead storage level now.

The irrigation department failed to put the indent to get 2 tmc-ft of water for storage at the Penna Ahobilam balancing reservoir of the KC Canal. This left the PABR at a poor storage of 2.31 tmc-ft as the TB dam suffered a rain deficit amid failure of the southwest monsoon.

The TB dam stopped releasing water to the high level canal of AP and this meant the dam’s storage was limited to 25.06 tmc-ft as against its 100.86 tmc-ft capacity.

PABR is the centre-point to meet the drinking water needs of Anantapur and Satya Sai districts through pipeline projects to Anantapur city, Rayadurg, Kalyanadurgam, Madakasira and Hindupur municipalities through separate pipelines. Hindupur is the tail-end part of the pipeline project and a first grade municipality. It got a relief after the Neelakantapuram Srirami Reddy drinking water project was initiated during the Congress rule.

Previously, the people of Hindupur town had to buy drinking water from private tankers and they even collected and stored rain water for domestic purposes.

Raghu, a resident of the Fort area of Hindupur feared worse conditions as the water supply was irregular.

For Anantapur city, water is filtered at the Kudair point and supplied to private taps after filling the nearby tanks. Water supply was regular on all days in the past, while it is confined to alternate days now, that too for a few hours. The rural areas are already facing a serious drinking water crisis.

In addition, there was hope that the Handri Neeva Sujala Shravanthi project would provide additional water of the Krishan backwaters from Srisailam in view of the worse condition at Srisailam dam this year. There was only 30 per cent water storage in the dam and no possibility of getting more water till the next monsoon season.