Gadchiroli May 29 (District Correspondent) The city of Gadchiroli has been facing acute drinking water supply problem for the last over a week. The citizens are quite irritated over the situation as they have to find other sources like bore wells or dug wells. Most of the dug wells also have dried up because of this year’s extreme hot weather which has made the situation more worrying.
Given the situation of scorching heat, and the water level in the Wainganga River basin, the main source of water supply to the city, having decreased, water supply tanks in the city have been running dry leaving the citizens to face this situation.
As a temporary solution to this problem, the Municipal Council has started constructing temporary soil embankments with the help of Pokland and JCB machines, to store water in the river basin. A letter has also been sent to the Guardian Minister and the District Collector requesting the release of water from the Gosikhurd Project so that water level in the river could be raised to supply it to the citizens.
The construction of the embankment is expected to be completed in the next couple of days. After this, water from the Gosikhurd Project will be released into the Wainganga River basin that will hopefully improve the water situation and regular water supply to citizens is expected to resume within the next, according to Mr. Leeladhar Bharadkar, water supply chairman of the municipal council.
He has appealed the citizens not to misuse water until 30 June 2026 and to use water carefully, and to avoid its wastage.
The city of Gadchiroli presently requires 62 lakhs litres of water as per the standard requirement of 135 litres of water per person, as per Mr. S. N. Sontakke, official with the water supply department. The present water supply system is quite insufficient to fulfil this requirement. Presently there are 9 overhead water supply tanks in the city with the storage capacity of 44.05 lakh litres of water but the administration is not in a position to utilize this capacity and supply the water because of the drying up of main source in River Wainganga.
A new water supply scheme has been taken up for the city considering the growing need of drinking water and this scheme is going to be completed in the next two years, it is informed.
Now all hopes are lying on the supply of water from the Gose Khurd Irrigation Project, the only source of water in the region. Sooner the water is supplied from this project, it will be possible for the municipal council to provide the water supply to the residents. Till then, the citizens will have to face the water crisis, it seems.
