Industries can now lift water from the Netravathi as Deputy Commissioner and District Magistrate A.B. Ibrahim has withdrawn all ban orders on drawing water from the river, issued by him earlier. The orders issued earlier were to be in force till May 31.
In an order issued on Thursday, Mr. Ibrahim said that as several parts of Dakshina Kannada have received rainfall, normality in drinking water supply to the city was being restored.
With this, Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd. and Mangalore Special Economic Zone Ltd. can lift water from AMR Power Pvt. Ltd. dam built across the Netravathi at Shambhoor in Bantwal taluk.
According to a corporation official, if MRPL lifted six million gallons a day (MGD), industries under SEZ Ltd. lifted eight MGD from the Shambhoor dam.
According to the order, industries elsewhere in the district could also lift water from dams for industrial purpose.
Water level in dam on the rise
It said that the water-level in the Thumbe vented dam, supplying drinking water to the city and some industries, which is in the downstream of the Shambhoor dam, was going up as inflow was picking up.
When the order was issued, the water-level at the Thumbe dam stood at 8.11 ft against the maximum level of 13 ft. (According to a corporation official, the water-level rose to 9 ft in the evening.)
The order said that it has been estimated that the storage at Thumbe would be enough for 15 days supply to the city.
The India Meteorological Department has estimated that monsoon would arrive in the end of first week of June.
If urea production at Mangalore Chemicals and Fertilizers Ltd. is suspended for some more days, it might affect fertilizer supply for kharif crops. Hence, it was decided to withdraw all earlier orders.
MCF Ltd. Director K. Prabhakar Rao went on record on Wednesday stating that the company stopped urea production since May 7, as it was not getting two MGD water from the corporation.
