Dam engineers allay fears of water scarcity; storage level of 58 percent is sufficient

Mysore/Mysuru: The water level at Krishna Raja Sagar (KRS) Dam is sufficient to meet the anticipated water requirements of the people in Mysuru, Mandya and Bengaluru regions during the summer months.

Speaking to Star of Mysore, KRS Dam Superintending Engineer (SE) Anand, who is the water releasing authority at KRS, said that the Dam has a storage level of 58 percent and allayed fears of drinking water crisis in Mysuru and its downstream cities and towns.

“The present storage level is 28.44 tmcft (thousand million cubic feet) and we are in a comfortable position to manage the water requirements of Mysuru, Srirangapatna, Mandya and Bengaluru,” he said. 

The storage in the Reservoir  is high as the monsoon of 2022 saw most districts of Karnataka, including the South-Interior region and the Cauvery catchment areas receiving excess rainfall. “Of the 28.44 tmcft storage level, the live capacity is 25 tmcft which will be used for drinking water supply and for standing crops in the months of March, April, May and June, till the 2023 South-West Monsoon arrives,” Anand added.

Due to excess rainfall, the KRS Dam received a cumulative inflow of 320 tmcft in 2022 alone and this is the highest inflow after 1962.

“What is alarming is that now, the KRS Dam is receiving a bare-minimum inflow of 139 cusecs which is the lowest so far. Usually, even in hot summer months, the Dam gets an inflow of up to 400 to 500 cusecs as there are a lot of perennial water springs in Cauvery River. But now the inflow is only 139 cusecs,” he added. 

Cauvery Neeravari Nigam Limited (CNNL) Assistant Executive Engineer Abu Farooq said that in March first week of 2021, the storage level of the Dam was 112 ft. as against a maximum level of 124.80 feet. “At present (today) we have a storage level of 104.66 feet and the crisis situation comes only when the storage level comes below 90 ft. There is no need for worry,”  he clarified.

Farooq added that there will be no drinking water crisis even at the peak of summer. “We will release water depending on the demand and only standing crops downstream will get water and no water will be supplied to new crops,” he added.