Over 25 tmc of water flows into Tamil Nadu from Karnataka in 7 days

CHENNAI: The State has received more than 25 tmcft from Karnataka in the last seven days, taking the live storage at Stanley Reservoir in Mettur to above 76 feet against its full capacity of 120 feet, on Monday.

The storage level stood at 43.220 feet (13,808 million cubic feet) at 8 am last Monday (July 15). Heavy rains in catchment areas of the Cauvery and its tributaries filled up dams in Kerala and Karnataka, which forced the latter to discharge surplus quantum water from the Kabini, KRS, Harangi, and Hemavathy reservoirs downstream.

This brought a whopping 25.57 tmcft from Karnataka in the last seven days to Tamil Nadu. As a result, the storage rose to 77.360 feet (39,377 mcft) at Mettur Dam.

Around 4 pm on Monday (July 22), the Stanley Reservoir was receiving an inflow of 76,794 cubic feet per second (cusecs).

“The Karnataka government was releasing 50,000 cusecs of surplus from KRS dam and 10,000 cusecs from Kabini dam by 4 pm on Monday. Besides this, nearly 40,000 cusecs were being released from Harangi and Hemavathy reservoirs,” said a senior WRD official, citing the 4 pm report on Monday.

The quantity of inflow received at the zero point at Biligundlu would further increase as hours pass. In the last 32 hours, starting from 8 am on Sunday, the level increased by 8.450 feet.

According to the Supreme Court’s order dated February 16, 2018, the Karnataka government should release 31.24 tmc for the month of July in a water year. It may be recalled that the Karnataka government refused to comply with the Cauvery Water Regulation Committee’s recommendation to release 1 tmc between July 12 and July 31.

Later, the neighbour decided to release 8,000 cusecs.

This forced the Tamil Nadu government to convene an all-party meeting to condemn Karnataka and also contemplated approaching the SC, if the CWRC recommendation was not adhered to.