After three consecutive years of drought, the State may be staring at an even grimmer situation in the Cauvery basin area this year, if the monsoon does not gain momentum in the next couple of weeks.
The storage in all four reservoirs of the Cauvery basin — Krishnaraja Sagar, Kabini, Hemavati and Harangi — is currently less than 50% of what it was last year, which was billed the worst in several decades. As per the Karnataka State Natural Disaster Monitoring Centre (KSNDMC) data, the total storage stood at 21.43 tmcft this year as against 48.26 tmcft in 2016.
Addressing a press conference here on Monday, Water Resources Minister M.B. Patil said the State had not lost hope yet as the Indian Meteorology Department had forecast spells of rain in the next one or two weeks.
When asked if the government would reserve water in the reservoirs for drinking purposes only, Mr. Patil said he would convene a meeting of representatives of boards of all the basin areas in the State after a week or two and take a call.
He said serious shortage had come in the way of releasing Cauvery water to Tamil Nadu as per the Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal’s order. As against the required release of 44 tmcft of water so far from June 2017, the State had released only 2.2 tmcft of water, he said.
The government will also launch cloud seeding initiative after assessing the rainfall for the next one or two weeks, the Minister said.
Meanwhile, Mr. Patil clarified that Karnataka had not diverted water from the Mahadayi river to Malaprabha basin as reported in a section of media.