Mumbai: All eyes, including that of the BMC, are set upon the monsoon arrival. The civic body has kept “fingers crossed” for early rains so that the city’s seven lakes could be replenished for supplying water to Mumbai for another year. On Tuesday, these lakes had cumulative stock of 2,12,461 million litres or 14.68 percent of the 14,47,363 lakh million litres total capacity. This current water stock will last for 55 days, so the city need not worry, said the BMC officials. The monsoon is expected to arrive by June 11.
Thanks to good rains last year, the current stock is higher as compared to this day in 2021, when it was 12.84 per cent. "Due to good rains last monsoon, all the seven lakes supplying water to the city were full. The monsoon is expected to start soon, so we have kept our fingers crossed," said a civic official from the hydraulic department.
Drawing from the lakes of Modak Sagar, Tansa, Vihar, Tulsi, Upper Vaitarna, Bhatsa and Middle Vaitarna, the BMC supplies 3,850 million litres of water everyday to the residents. In recent years, the civic body has started looking for additional sources of water, with experiments like rainwater harvesting, digging borewells, desalination, etc. But, rains have always been the main source of water for the city. The BMC takes stock of the water level in the lakes on October 1 annually.
In August 2020, Mumbai faced water cuts as levels in catchment areas of the lakes were low due to a lack of rainfall. No water cut was imposed in 2019, owing to good rains, while the BMC had imposed a 10 per cent water cut in 2018, a 20 per cent cut in 2016, and a 25 per cent cut in 2014.
