Water scarcity: Chennai moves from crisis to catastrophe, sees the start of an exodus

For residents of Chennai, lifestyles have changed this summer—changes that acute water scarcity has brought to the city.

• Waiting in line with pots for the elusive water tanker

• Waking up at 1.00 am to work at the water pump

• Going out unwashed

• Giving up every other work when the

private tanker comes home

• Forgetting their potted plants

• Not bathing pets

• Using dispensable cutlery and utensils

These are just some of the changes that residents in Chennai have been forced to adapt.

Yet, the government is on a denial mode with Chief Minister Edapadi K Palanisamy saying that the state is tackling the situation. The government is tapping ground water to provide for the people water through tankers, he said without taking into account the fact that the ground water too has dried up in many areas and people are drilling with the hope of finding new aquifers beneath their feet.

On another side of the sinister spectrum, of the four reservoirs that feed the city of over one crore people, Chembarambakkam, Cholavaram and Redhills are bone dry and Poodi has just 26 mcft of water against its capacity of 3,231 mcft.

So, where does the little drops that the Chennai Metrowater Supply and Sewerage Board provide through its pipelines and tankers come from? Two desalination plants in Nemmeli and Minjur account for 180 MLD and another 180 MLD comes from Veeranam lake, situated 235 km away from Chennai and filled by Cauvery water, while the rest is from underground or quarries around the city. Yet, as the government told the High Court, water supply has declined from 830 MLD to 525 MLD in June 2017 itself and now it is even lower.

But traditionally, a good part of Chennai was never dependent on Metrowater supply at all. Many gated communities and high rise residential apartments, which had been buying water from private suppliers or having borewells, have rationed water as the suppliers are unable to meet the demand and the wells have dried up. Most of the private companies too are not able to get water from the private suppliers, who have raised the rates, and many IT companies have asked employees to work from home.

The fear of many companies shifting operations to other cities, residents moving elsewhere and large-scale unemployment gripping the city with construction activities coming to a standstill looms over the city as the water crisis is unlikely to end until the skies open up.

And that can happen, if at all, only after October.