: Though summer is yet to set in, most parts of Palakkad district are facing acute shortage of drinking and irrigation water, with the drying up of its major water sources.
Water in Malampuzha dam, the State’s largest irrigation dam, was released twice in the last one week in view of shortage of drinking water in Shoranur and Ottappalam regions.
Drawing of water from pump houses located on the bed of the almost dried-up Bharatapuzha has become impossible and it would take four more days for the released water from Malampuzha to reach the pump houses. Normal functioning of the Ottappalam, Shoranur, Ongallur and Vallapuzha drinking water schemes has been crippled in the last one week.
In the previous years, the shutters of the Malampuzha dam were opened only in April-end.
Meanwhile, there is a scramble for drinking water, supplied in tanker lorries, in Chittur, the worst-hit taluk. More grama panchayats located on the eastern borders of the district are increasingly relying on such lorries.
The scarcity is acute in rain shadow areas such as Vadakarapathy, Erithyampathy, and Kozhinjampara and the 745 sq km stretch of the Attappady tribal belt.
Almost all rivers, reservoirs, ponds, and wells have dried up much ahead of the onset of summer.
In the Attappady tribal heartland, Pudur and Sholayur grama panchayats are in the grip of a drought-like situation.
Rivers and streams have dried up, leading to water shortage in 70 of the 100 tribal hamlets in the two local bodies.
The Agali grama panchayat is also facing drinking water shortage.
Tribespeople used to collect water from the rivulets and streams originating from the forests.
Since all these water sources have dried up, they now travel kilometres to collect water from the Bhavani river that flows to Tamil Nadu through the Attappady Hills.
