With only 4.9% water stock left, BMC starts drawing from reserves

MUMBAI: With only 4.9% stock left in the seven lakes that supply water to the city, the BMC has begun to dip into its reserves. Civic officials said their hand has been forced due to insufficient rainfall in catchment areas since the monsoon set in earlier this week.
Although the city’s water situation is worrying, civic officials said there is no need to panic as adequate arrangements are in place for supply till July-end. The normal date for onset of monsoon over Mumbai is June 10; this year it arrived on June 25.
The current 10% water cut will continue and there won’t be any additional cut, assured civic officials.
As on June 27, the total water stock in the lakes was 71,574 million litres. By contrast, on the same day last year, it stood at 2.7 lakh million litres. A senior BMC official said they have begun to use water from Bhatsa’s reserve stock.
“We started using the reserve water two-three days ago. Also, water from Upper Vaitarna has been brought down to Middle Vaitarna. We will start using the reserve water from there as well in the next few days,” the official said.