Dip in lake levels evokes knee-jerk reaction from BMC

“The police are already filing FIRs against those involved in water thefts. Immediate action will be taken against those guilty and their water connections will be cut. At present,we only seize booster pumps that are installed illegally. But now we will initiate stringent legal action against anyone who misuses water or tamper with water metres or installations,” said Kshatriya.

While the monsoons in 2008 brought 16,406 mm of rainfall over the catchment areas of the six lakes,last year’s monsoon saw only 10,373 mm of rainfall.

While city-based Vihar lake has already reached the lowest drawable water level,the Upper Vaitarna lake on the outskirts of the city along with Modak Sagar lakes are just .20 metres above the drawable mark. Both these lakes together supply 930 million litres of water to the city in a day. The total available water in all the lakes on Tuesday was 2,24,320 million litres as compared to 3,98,374 million litres on the same day last year.

Though the city has been facing a 15 per cent water cut on domestic users and thirty per cent cut on commercial users,the civic body has maintained the that cuts will not be increased any further till July 15. While the supply of water is 3,450 mld against its demand of 4,250 mld,the BMC is currently supplying about 2,900 mld owing to the water cut.