BENGALURU, India (AP) — Bhavani Mani Muthuvel and her family of nine have approximately five 20-liter (5-gallon) buckets of water for the week to use for cooking, cleaning, and household chores.
"Everything is being done in shifts; from taking showers to using the restroom and doing laundry," she said. They can only afford this kind of water.
Muthuvel lives in Bengaluru's Whitefield neighborhood in Ambedkar Nagar, a low-income community next to the ostentatious offices of several multinational software companies. Muthuvel typically uses piped water that comes from groundwater. But the supply is running out. In her 40 years living in the neighborhood, she said it was the greatest water issue she had ever seen.
Bangalore Water Scarcity Problem In Karnataka
Bengaluru, located in southern India, is experiencing an unusually hot February and March, and in recent years, it has received minimal rainfall, partly due to human-induced climate change. Water levels are alarmingly low, especially in poorer areas, resulting in exorbitant water costs and a rapidly diminishing supply.
City and state government authorities are implementing emergency measures such as nationalizing water tankers and capping water prices to address the situation. However, water experts and many residents are concerned that the worst is yet to come in April and May when the summer sun is at its peak.
According to Shashank Pallor, a hydrologist based in Bengaluru and affiliated with the think tank Water, Environment, Land, and Livelihood Labs, the crisis was inevitable.
"Bangalore happens to be one amongst the most rapidly growing cities worldwide, and its supply of clean water equipment has failed to keep up pace with its growing a population," he added.
Groundwater, relied upon by over a third of the city's 13 million residents, is rapidly depleting. Despite some borewells being drilled to depths of 1,500 feet, city authorities report that 6,900 out of the 13,900 borewells in the city have run dry. Those dependent on groundwater, like Muthuvel, now have to rely on water tankers that extract water from nearby villages.
Palur mentioned that El Nino, a natural phenomenon that...
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