WATER SCARREDCITY

Bengaluru's water crisis was long in the making. The city has grown at the cost of its lakes and ponds that are key to its water security. Over 93 per cent of the city is built-up, which makes groundwater recharge difficult. Inadequate sewage systems pollute the limited water available. Over the decades, the city has become dependent on the Cauvery, 100 km away, for 70 per cent of its water needs. This makes water unaffordable. It's time Bengaluru broadened its water resource base beyond the Cauvery and focused on recharging groundwater and reusing treated wastewater.

- Sushmita Sengupta Swati Bhatia, M Raghuram and Coovercolly Indresh

SAUBHAGYA MISHRA, who works for an outsourcing major in Karnataka's capital city Bengaluru, manages distribution mechanism for many water utilities in Australia and the US. "I have coded flawless mechanism to deliver water to thousands of houses thousands of kilometres away from here. But in February, I got a notice from my apartment management informing complete cessation of water supply. This was a first for me," he says. "Without water, what supply solution can one think of?" he says.

In mid-March, Mishra sent his wife and daughter to their hometown Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh. With the family gone, he could bring down water use by two-thirds. He somehow procures 10-15 litres of "mineral water" from a vendor daily that he uses for all purposes. But he has worries: "How long the crisis would continue? More importantly, why did it happen?"

India's prime information-technology hub and the country's third most populated city, Bengaluru is facing its worst water shortage. On March 18, after a high-level meeting on the crisis, Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah told the media that the city was facing a water shortage of 500 million litres per day (MLD) against a daily demand of 2,600 MLD. Of the 14,000 government-registered borewells in Bengaluru, some 6,900 had dried, said Siddaramaiah.

A total of 257 areas in the city have been identified as water stressed. Besides, 55 of 110 villages under the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) face water crisis.

A week before, on March 12, the Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB) reduced water supply to major consumers companies, hospitals, railways and airports in the city by 20 per cent. Previously, it had been supplying them 95-100 per cent of their allotted quota of water.