BMC starts 20% water cut in city as lake levels still low

MUMBAI: Amidst the extremely heavy downpour over the past two days, the BMC implemented a 20% water cut in the city from Wednesday, due to poor rainfall in catchment areas in July.
Although it has been raining heavily for the past two days in districts close to the catchment areas of five lakes that supply water to Mumbai, the stock rose just 2% in the 24 hours till Wednesday morning.
Civic officials said they have reduced the water-releasing capacity of these lakes by 20%. The cut will continue or can even be increased if the water level does not rise by September-end.
Five of the seven lakes that supply potable water to the city are Bhatsa, Tansa, Upper Vaitarna, Middle Vaitarna and Lower Vaitarna (Modak Sagar), situated in Thane, Palghar and Nashik. These supply 97% of the total 14.5 lakh million litre the city needs. The rest is supplied by Vihar and Tulsi in the city. After Tulsi, Vihar overflowed on Wednesday. Half of the water, 7.2 lakh million litre, the city gets is from Bhatsa. It had 2.9 lakh million litre (41%) stock till Wednesday.