Gujarat cities brace for dry summer: Surat begins to cut supply, Vadodara opts for tubewells

With lesser rainfall during the last monsoon, the water in Ukai dam did not rise to its maximum level, prompting Surat irrigation department Superintendent Engineer S R Mahakal to send out a letter to the SMC, five municipalities of Ankleshwar, Sachin, two in Navsari and Valsad, and industries using water of Ukai dam, appealing them to save water and not waste it due to the shortage of water in the dam. Mahakal said, “As the summer is around the corner and seeing the quantity of water available in the dam, it is difficult to meet the requirement, as a result of which we have appealed to all the beneficiaries to save the water and make some alternate arrangements.”

Mahakal added, “This year, we have also decided to reduce the water for irrigation. Earlier, the rotation of water supply for irrigation was over 25 days. Now, we have made it 16 days. We have requested farmers not to sow paddy crops that consume large quantity of water and go for other crop in which less water is used.”

K H Khatwani, Additional City Engineer at SMC, said, “We have received a letter from the irrigation department about the shortage of water in the dam. We will take the help of social media and put up hoardings in different locations of the city, appealing to the residents to use water wisely.”

The VMC, on the other hand, is exploring an alternate option to meet the imminent water deficit as the civic body is heavily dependent on Narmada and Mahisagar rivers for its supply of water. For its demand of 510 MLD for a population of about 18 lakhs, Vadodara receives 75 MLD of water at its Khanpur plant from the Narmada authority, Sardar Sarovar Narmada Nigam Ltd (SSNNL). It gets about 290 MLD water from Mahisagar, which is also running low on its natural reserve. The remaining water comes from the civic body’s own reservoir in Ajwa, which draws surplus water from the Narmada canal. Currently, Ajwa, too, has reached a level of 208 feet and will be able to help the VMC sustain itself until May.

The officials of the VMC’s water department, however, assure that the city is “well prepared” to deal with the crisis and that there will be no problem in the supply of drinking water. Alpesh Majumdar, Additional City Engineer, VMC, said, “We are preparing a feasibility report to add tubewells in our premises where water tanks are located. We have sought a study report of agencies that have compiled the data of the underground water tables to help us ascertain which parts of the city can have tubewells added to make up for the deficit. This work will be completed on a war footing basis, ahead of the summer.”

In an internal communication, the water department of the VMC has proposed to install new tubewells as well as make the existing tubewells operational in the days to come. The internal communication will soon be presented to the Standing Committee for approval. The circular also states that a new submersible pump will be installed at the Ajwa reservoir to use the stored water to its maximum capacity. In addition, the circular also proposes a water cut of 10 minutes in each zone to reduce the water supply time from the existing one hour to 50 minutes per day.