In spite of the falling trend of flood into the major reservoirs in the upper Krishna Basin in Karnataka following receding rains in the catchment areas, sizeable inflows were reaching Almatti, Narayanpur and others across Krishna and its tributaries as on Monday night.
The Central Water Commission (CWC) has assessed that over 14.65 tmc ft of water would reach Almatti in 24 hours till 8 a.m. on Tuesday and it would be about 14.3 tmc ft each into Narayanpur and Jurala in the downstream. The inflows in Almatti were at 1.3 lakh cusecs on Monday evening and the outflows were over 1.09 lakh cusecs.
Similarly, Narayanpur was getting 1.3 lakh cusecs with a discharge of over 1.09 lakh cusecs. However, Jurala was still getting a flood of 1.95 lakh cusecs at 9 p.m. on Monday and the discharge was nearly 1.66 lakh cusecs from 25 spillway gates and another 28,000 cusecs after power generation. Mahabaleshwar area recorded 5 cm rain in the 24 hours period up to 8.30 a.m. on Monday and it would help the inflows into Almatti sustain further.
However, the chances of release of flood from Hidkal dam across Ghataprabha, a major tributary of Krishna, have increased with the reservoir still getting about 17,700 cusecs flood and the flood cushion remaining less than 4 tmc ft. The project has a storage of 47.15 tmc ft on Monday morning against its capacity of 51 tmc ft.
Similarly, the chances of surplus of Tungabhadra dam have also increased with the CWC forecasting inflows of about 8 tmc ft water in 24 hours period up to 8 a.m. on Tuesday. Against its capacity of 100.86 tmc ft, the reservoir had storage of 76 tmc ft around 6 p.m. on Monday. The reservoir was getting over 1.07 lakh cusecs of flood in the evening.
Srisailam reservoir in the downstream of Krishna was also getting around 1.77 lakh cusecs flood from the upstream at 9 p.m. on Monday and the CWC has forecast that it would get about 16 tmc ft water in the 24 hour period up to 8 a.m. on Tuesday.
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