The drinking water scarcity plaguing Bengaluru has brought the focus on Mysuru and the contingency plans to overcome the crisis if any by the local authorities.
The Mysuru Zilla Panchayat has been conducting regular meetings with the PDOs of all villages and has mapped 134 villages where a full-blown crisis could unfold over the next two months, according to K.M. Gayatri, CEO, Mysuru ZP.
“We have a contingency plan for 134 villages where the groundwater table could drop and there is a task force that is continuously monitoring the situation. But for now, there is enough water at source and supply will not be affected,” she added.
Even if village or parts of Mysuru city were to be affected, it will be more due to the distribution network and not due to non-availability of water at source.
Ranjith Kumar, Executive Engineer, Rural Water Supply, Mysuru ZP, said that they have prepared a report on the present water supply scenario for the entire district and it was being updated regularly.
The ZP has identified 134 villages which are likely to be affected by the water crisis based on the geographical situation and groundwater table levels. Accordingly, 27 villages are in Mysuru, 20 villages in H.D. Kote, 19 in Saligrama, 16 in K.R. Nagar, 15 in Periyapatna, 14 in Nanjangud, 12 in Hunsur, 6 in T. Narsipura and 5 villages in Saragur taluk.
Only 2 villages — 1 each in Mysuru and H.D.Kote — will have water problems immediately while 19 villages are expected to bear the brunt of scarcity within the next 15 days. About 88 villages will have problems after a month and another 24 villages will experience water scarcity in two months time, said Mr. Kumar.
This is based on the water availability at source and the ZP has also identified 134 borewells in the district where the yield is low or could dry up in the weeks ahead. Hence they have also identified 88 private borewells with good yield to augment water supply and agreements will be signed with them shortly. In case the watertable depletes further supply through tankers could be the last resort to handle the exigency on the drinking water front and to tide over the scarcity, said Mr. Kumar.
While Mysuru city is supplied by the Cauvery and the Kabini rivers and could escape the brunt of scarcity in the days ahead, piped water supply was yet to be covered in all villages.
The ZP officials said that there are 31 multi-village drinking water schemes sanctioned for Mysuru district and are at various stages of implementation but none of them have been completed.
Besides, 7 of the 31 projects are in the tendering stage and once completed, all the villages will get surface water through pipes. There are districts where 400 to 500 villages have been affected but Mysuru was relatively better off, the officials added.
The crisis this year has been aggravated owing to monsoon failure last year. The last time Mysuru faced such a crisis was in 2016 and 2017.
