In the wake of Kerala restricting water from Siruvani dam, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin on Monday wrote to his Kerala counterpart requesting him to direct officials to maintain the storage of the Siruvani dam up to its full reservoir level (FRL) i.e. 878.50 m, so as to provide uninterrupted water supply to the Coimbatore Corporation and other beneficiaries of the project.
In the letter, he also requested the Kerala Chief Minister to direct officials to increase the water supply from the Siruvani dam to enable supply of 101.40 MLD.
“If storage of water to its full capacity is not maintained, the Coimbatore Corporation and adjoining areas, depending on Siruvani water, will be affected severely during the ensuing summer,” a copy of the letter shared with the media read.
Since January 3, the Kerala Irrigation Department has controlled the intake tower, and it was informed it cannot regulate the flow until further orders from the Kerala Government, Mr. Stalin said.
Siruvani dam is a prime source of water supply to Coimbatore city. Of the current total water requirement of 265 MLD for Coimbatore Corporation, 101.4 MLD was to be supplied from Siruvani dam.
In spite of adequate rainfall in the Siruvani catchment area, Kerala was maintaining the storage level in Siruvani Dam at 877.0m only instead of the FRL of 878.50m for the past three years.
“Due to the lowering of water level by 1.50m, only 528 mcft of water could be stored against the capacity of 650 mcft, resulting in a storage loss of 122 mcft (19% of total storage). Consequently, only about 85 MLD of water could be supplied from the scheme as against 101.40 MLD,” Mr. Stalin pointed out.
Regular meetings were being held by the officials of the Tamil Nadu Water Supply and Drainage Board with the Kerala Irrigation Department officials to store water up to the FRL, and the Tamil Nadu Municipal Administration and Water Supply Department had taken up this issue with Kerala’s Water Resources Department.
“However, despite repeated requests, the Kerala Irrigation Department has not taken any steps to maintain the storage level of Siruvani dam at FRL.”
As per an agreement for this project between Tamil Nadu and Kerala governments in 1973, water not exceeding 1.30 TMC annually (July 1 to June 30) was to be supplied to the erstwhile Coimbatore Municipal Town for drinking water purpose for 99 years.
“Though, the agreement provides for supply of water up to 1.30 TMC, the actual supply is far less than that,” Mr. Stalin added.
However, over the past six years, Tamil Nadu has received water ranging from 0.484 TMC to 1.128 TMC. The amount of water received was 0.964 TMC in 2015-16; 0.484 TMC in 2016-17; 0.803 TMC in 2017-18; 1.040 TMC in 2018-19; 1.090 TMC in 2019-20; and 1.128 TMC in 2020-21.
