People of Chennai heaved a sigh of relief after a 50-wagon train carrying 2.5 million litres of water arrived at the parched city on Friday afternoon from Jolarpet railway station. A second train will also carry more water to the crisis-hit city. The Chennai Metro Water has decided to ferry at least 10 million litres a day.
The train took 5 hours to reach Chennai from Jolarpet. Each wagon of the train carried up to 50,000 litres of water.
Tamil Nadu Ministers including D Jayakumar and SP Velumani were present at Chennai's Villivakkam railway yard to welcome the train. To celebrate the arrival of the train, an event was planned at the station with the party members in attendance.
The Chennai Metro Water will be charged Rs 7.5 lakh for reach trip with the state government allotting Rs 65 crore for the project.
Chennai is receiving 525 million litres of water per day from the Chennai Metropolitan Water Supply and Sewage Board when it is supposed to receive 830 million litres a day. Tamil Nadu Chief Minister E Palaniswami had announced that Chennai will receive 10 million litres of water daily from Jolarpet.
Chennai had initially depended on four reservoirs on the outskirts for its water supply. There are -- Cholavaram reservoir (1081 mcft at full capacity), Redhills reservoir (3,300 mcft at full capacity), Chembarabakkam Lake (3,645 mcft at full capacity) and the Poondi reservoir (3231 mcft at full capacity). Poondi reservoir still has 16 mcft while the other three have run completely dry, IANS reports.
The government think tank, NITI Aayog has predicted that Chennai will run completely out of water by 2021. NITI Aayog had also predicted 21 other cities to run out of water in two years time.
