Karnataka   

Project to install telemetric rain gauges nearing completion

— PHOTO: M.A. SRIRAM

For rain data: The meteorological station of the Department of Water Resources in Mysore.

MYSORE: Karnataka’s eight-year “mission” to measure rainfall on real time basis will be accomplished in the next two months when hi-tech telemetric rain gauges are installed in 607 hoblis in the State to access information in just 15 minutes.

The Drought Monitoring Cell (DMC) of the Karnataka State Natural Disaster Monitoring Centre (KSNDMC), a registered society of the State Government, is on the verge of completing the ambitious project of installing telemetric rain gauges in hobli headquarters. Rain gauges have been installed in 607 hoblis and they will be installed in the remaining 140 hoblis in two months.

Once the installation of gauges is completed, Karnataka will become one of the few States in the country to implement the state-of-the-art system of measuring rainfall on real time basis.

The cell, which has designed the gauges, has also installed them in 100 gram panchayats on a pilot basis. Other gram panchayats may be covered in a phased manner.

Telemetric rain gauges help in studying the rainfall pattern in different areas and caution farmers in case of calamities such as floods and drought in advance.

The master control room at KSNDMC in Bangalore gets information from the gauges at an interval of 15 minutes. It keeps transmitting the data which is updated and compiled.

The information is later uploaded to the KSNDMC’s website and sent to the offices of deputy commissioners and the Agriculture Department in each districts. Besides, the deputy commissioners, joint directors of agriculture, assistant directors of agriculture and other designated officers in districts get the data through SMS alerts from the control room.

The cell began installing the gauges in December 2007. “We started working on the gauge in 2001. After developing the prototype, we took three years to study its functioning before we went for its installation. Only after we ensured its foolproof operation, we began installing it in December 2007. A committee of experts supervises the project,” DMC Director V.S. Prakash said.

He told The Hindu that the cost of installation and operation of each gauge for five years would be around Rs. 50,000.

Citing the benefits of telemetric rain gauges, Mr. Prakash said the cell was getting rainfall data from 1,000 sq km area of the Linganamakki region once in a week.

“We get data from 17 places in the Linganamakki area in just 15 minutes. Rain data is available in real time for the benefit of various departments,” he added.

Even Raitha Samparka Kendras are updated with real time rainfall information. The Joint Director of Agriculture, Mysore, Vishakanta, said: “The faster and accurate rain data helps us to make preparations for agriculture. Instead of waiting for manual rain data a day after the place received rain we get factual rain results on real time basis which is beneficial.”

Before the telemetric gauges were introduced, rain data was collected by the Revenue, Public Works and Water Resources departments in the districts. This data was compiled and submitted to the taluk agriculture office which in turn submitted it to the joint director’s office in each district.

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