FPJ POLITICAL BUREAU Mumbai
With the summer season set to reach its peak, as many as 1,014 villages and 4,162 hamlets in the State are being provided drinking water through 1,069 tankers.
The various dams in the State are on
ly filled with 27 per cent of its capacity as compared to 42 per cent last year.
The seriousness of the situation can be understood by the fact that on April 21this year, 1,069 tankers were plying for water supply as compared to 53 tankers used on the same date last year.
According to officials, as per April 21 statistics, 280 government and 789 private tankers had been pressed into service to supply water to these villages and hamlets.
The highest number of affected villages were in western Maharashtra where 462 villages and 2,986 hamlets were being provided water through 534 tankers.
The worst- affected was Sangli district where 147 villages and 1,123 hamlets were experiencing water shortage, while in Kolhapur, only one village was supplied drinking water through two tankers. In Vidarbha, except Nagpur and Wardha, there was no water scarcity. In Nagpur district, only 12 villages and two villages in Wardha were experiencing water scarcity.
Dams and water The State has overall 2,436 dams including small, medium and large ones with capacity of 36,713 million cubic meter ( MCM) water.
On April 16, the storage of water was just 10,015 MCM which means 27 percent of its capacity. On the same date in 2011 and 2010, the water storage was 42 percent and 29 percent respectively.
Pune region which comprises western Maharashtra is most affected as it has nearly half of the water storage when compared to figures of 2011.
On April 16 of this year, water storage in 595 projects of Pune region was 2626 MCM and in 2011, it was 4421 MCM. Situation in Marathwada is also serious as the water availability in dams this year is less than half of the water in the last year.
1,014 villages and 4,162 hamlets in State get water through tankers as various dams are only filled with 27 pc of their capacity as compared t o 42 pc last year Region Year
