The Tamil Nadu Water Supply and Drainage Board has provided nearly 2,000 million litres a day of drinking water to various districts except Chennai last month. This is the first time in TWAD’s history that such a large quantity has been supplied.
According to a press release, there has been a steady rise in the drinking water supply since May 2017. TWAD supplied 1,816 mld in May last year and it was further increased to 2,000 mld in December 2019. As the major dams across the State have a storage of 158 thousand million cubic feet of water (TMC) against their capacity of 200 TMC, TWAD is confident to maintain the supply for another five months.
Moreover, the average groundwater table has also increased by three metres in January this year. The water table has risen from 17.5 metres to 14.5 metres observed in May last year. TWAD observed the water level through 1,286 wells.
In the release, TWAD’s managing director C.N. Mahesvaran said the Board identified reasons for deficiency in its distribution system through a SWOT (strength, weakness, opportunity and threat) analysis. Some of them were power supply interruptions, leak and bursts in pipeline, over-drawal and illegal extractions in certain areas.
The Board initiated water tanker supply to un-served areas in places such as Ramanathapuram and took up work to revamp pipeline infrastructure, augment sources and improve supply.
TWAD has one State-level water testing laboratory, 31 district level and 56 sub district level laboratories for monitoring water quality and residents may test water quality at a cost of ₹1,000, the release said.
