While the authorities in Chandigarh have been making tall claims of making 24X7 water supply from this year, the ground reality is that the city residents will have to grapple with a huge shortfall of water supply.
Even as the administrations of the three cities have taken steps such as banning watering of lawns and washing of vehicles using running water, this is unlikely to be of much help.
Officials in the municipal corporation reveal that at present, Chandigarh is short of 29 million gallons daily (MGD).
The city receives 87 MGD water against a demand of 116 MGD, a shortage of 29 MGD.
“The work on the phases 5 and 6 of the Kajauli waterworks is in progress and we are hopeful that the city will get extra 35 MGD water by the next summer and residents will be getting 24X7 water supply,” said Chandigarh MC commissioner B Purushartha.
The Haryana Urban Development Authority (HUDA), that looks after water supply in Panchkula, is currently supplying 22-24 MGD water to city.
But as the summer approaches, the consumption will increase to 28-30 MGD in peak summer.
Even if water supply from the Kaushalya dam gets exhausted, we have enough tubewells installed in the city to take care of the rising water demand during summer.
The increase in demand and failure to increase the supply proportionately are the main reasons behind water scarcity.
In SAS Nagar, many sectors are yet to get canal water and most of the water supply is met by tubewells.