BMC to review the decision to conduct water cuts

While the urban water crisis in Mumbai has been worsening, this year, the people of Mumbai have been facing water shortage in the last couple of weeks due to insufficient rainfall. However, as per recent reports, the BMC is to re-examine the decision to impose 20 per cent water cuts in Mumbai. 

With the monsoons arriving at the end of July, the civic body had decided to implement a water cut of 20 per cent from August 5 in view of the situation. However, due to the continual downpour experienced by the city recently, the lakes that supply water to the city have been gradually filling up. On Sunday, August 16, the water supply reached 11 lakh million litres.

Out of the seven lakes that supply water to Mumbai, Tansa Lake is 91 per cent full. Therefore, the crisis of water scarcity on Mumbaikars is likely to be resolved soon, as confirmed by the Municipal Commissioner Iqbal Singh Chahal. Moreover, he has asserted to withdraw the water cut soon.

In the last 10 days, the percentage of water has increased by more than 40 per cent. Due to the continual downpour which lashed the city from August 4, the water level in Upper Vaitarna, Modaksagar, Tansa, Madhya Vaitarna, Bhatsa, Tulsi and Vihar lakes has been increasing rapidly.

On August 4, the lake had a storage capacity of 5 lakhs 5 thousand million litres. By August 15, the water supply had reached 10 lakhs 37 thousand million litres whereas, on Sunday, it reached 10 lakhs 99 thousand 445 million litres. Another three and a half million litres of water is needed to fill all the lakes supplying water to the city.

Sachin Sawant, GS and spokesperson of MPCC, had earlier asked the Municipal Commissioner to reconsider the decision of water cut in view of the Ganeshotsav. As per reports, the commissioner responded positively to this demand and promised to withdraw the water cut in the near future.