Mumbai: Despite announcing that water-cuts
would continue till September end, BMC on Friday rolled back its
decision and said supply of the precious commodity would not
be stopped for a month due to the ongoing festival season.
The city has been facing water-cuts since June last year
due to scanty rainfalls. Currently, residential and commercial
users are facing 7 and 30 per cent water-cut respectively.
"We are lifting the water-cuts from tomorrow for a month
keeping in mind the increased requirement of water during
festivals like Ramzan, Dahi Handi and Ganesh Chaturthi," BMC
commissioner Swadhin Kshatriya told reporters here.
The BMC's decision comes three days after it announced
that water-cuts in the city would continue till September end
as the water crisis was not fully over.
Presently there is 11,07,565 million litres of water in
all the six lakes that supply water to the city. However, the
requirement is 13,5000 million litres of water.
"Though we are falling short by over two lakh million
litres, water stock in the lakes is satisfactory as compared
to last year," Kshatriya said adding the civic body would
review the situation once again on October 1.
While four lakes - Modak Sagar, Tansa, Vihar and Tulsi
- have started overflowing, two other lakes, which are the
largest supplier of water - Bhatsa and Upper Vaitarna are
falling short by 16 and 36 per cent respectively.
While the city's daily demand is 4,250 million litres,
the civic body supplies around 3,450 million litres per day.
PTI
First Published: Friday, August 27, 2010, 18:55