Krishna water flows straight to Tamil Nadu

Officials hope that water is expected to reach Poondi reservoir on Sunday evening and the inflow will gradually raise storage in the reservoir.

According to officials, the AP irrigation department, after repeated appeals, released Krishna water from Kandaleru reservoir in the last month. However, they stopped releasing water at one point citing that the farmers in the AP were cultivating crops and there was no rain. As the north-east mon soon was not good in TN and level in all the lakes was fast declining, the state PWD officials were again approaching their counterpart and AP irrigation officials released 1,500 cusecs on November 7. However, farmers were found illegally pumping out water for irrigation and water seeped in through the canal, the officials added. 

“After AP officials closed some small sluices, the flow was good and water reached zero point at around 4 am and water may flow into the reservoir Sunday evening,” said an engineer. The level of inflow at zero point was 90 cusecs and they were monitoring the canal to prevent water theft.  Another engineer said they learnt that the AP officials might increase the quantum of release of Krishna water. “We clearly explained that the Chennai is about to grapple with drinking water scarcity and we appealed to our counterpart to release more water to increase the storage capacity,” he said and added that the level in the reservoir was 17.05 feet against 35 feet. 

Meanwhile, water was continuously released to Red Hills for drinking water purpose and the Chennai metro water was pumping out water from the lakes including Veeranam lake. 

It may be noted that on Saturday, local administration minister S P Velumani conducted review meeting and instructed the CMWSSB officials to ensure metro water supply without interruption. The minister said that the CMWSSB could establish borewells, if need. During the 2015 summer, the metro water officials opted for renting private agricultural borewells to tackle the drinking water scarcity.