BENGALURU'S GREAT THIRST

Summer has just begun, but the weak monsoon of 2023 has left over half of India's Silicon Valley an arid zone. Even as tankers try to reach the parched millions, the city looks at alternate drinking water solutions

- AJAY SUKUMARAN

In 2022, after copious rains, roads in Bengaluru's famed IT corridor turned into waterways. Viral images showed the humble tractor becoming the chief mode of emergency transport for a bit-even corporate honchos clambered atop them to escape their inundated villas, and office-goers chose them as the only way to reach their waterlogged work spaces. Now, the pendulum has swung the other way. With the 2023 monsoon tilting towards a cyclical dip-and an 18 per cent deficient rainfall over Karnataka―the depletion in groundwater levels has led to dry borewells in many parts of the city, leaving Bengaluru to battle a severe water shortage crisis. And the harsh Deccan summer has just begun.

How severe is this crisis? With a population of 14 million, Bengaluru's total water requirement is in the range of 2,600 million litres a day (MLD). A little over half of this comes from the Cauvery flowing 100 km away-pumping 1,450 MLD all the way and up a steep gradient into Bengaluru is an engineering feat by itself. However, Cauvery water connections are available only to the city's core part. The rest of the city depends on borewells-of which there are over 4,60,000, private as well as publicwhich supply 1,250 MLD of its water needs. And, as Karnataka deputy chief minister D.K. Shivakumar pointed out, about 50 per cent of the city's public borewells have run dry. While public borewells constitute less than five per cent of total borewells in the city, private borewells, which form the majority, have also started running dry. Officials estimate there is a deficit of 25-30 per cent in water yield from borewells, leading to a shortfall of 200-300 MLD.