The drinking water crisis in Ongole city has worsened with no water replenishment happening for the two summer storage tanks from the Nagarjunasagar reservoir since the onset of the southwest monsoon.
Now Ongolites pin their hopes on the Krishna River Management Board meeting slated for later this week for relief.
Even as Prakasam district experienced widespread rains, all the drinking water tanks in the district are almost empty.
The district administration has sought 4 tmcft of Krishna water to fill the drinking water tanks in the district.
“If there is no water release from Nagarjunasagar in a week or so, the civic body will not be in a position to supply drinking water to the denizens,” according to Ongole Municipal Commissioner S. Venkatakrishna. “We are facing the worst-ever crisis this year,” he said after taking stock of the situation.
The available water will be sufficient for four more rounds, explained Municipal Engineer D. Sundarama Reddy.
“We hope to get some relief at the KRMB meet on August 22,” he added.
The civic body had introduced once-in-5 days water supply to pull on till reservoirs across river Krishna in the State get copious inflows from the upper riparian States of Karnataka and Maharashtra.
While the storage in the summer storage tank-I is only 450 million litres as against its full capacity of 1,950 million litres, it is nil in the summer storage tank-II with a water holding capacity of 3,850 million litres.
Gundlakamma of no help
In the present situation, drawal of water from the Obul Reddy Gundlakamma reservoir as a temporary measure is ruled out as the water level in the reservoir has gone down below the minimum draw down level, according to OMC officials.
The only silver lining is that Almatti in Karnataka is almost full and fresh flows into the river are expected to fill the major reservoirs across the Krishna.
