MADURAI: The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court on Friday sought a report from the Karur Collector on a PIL seeking direction to release water from Amaravathi Dam to the old Ayacut for drinking water purposes.
The litigant P Meignanamoorthi of Aravakurichi taluk in Karur stated in his petition that the Amaravathi Dam has a total storage capacity of 90 feet of water (approximately 4,047 million cubic feet). The old Amaravathi ayacut has 15 anaicuts through which it irrigates about 11,893 hectares of land through 25 irrigation channels in Tiruppur and Karur districts. It is also the primary drinking water source for the people of Karur, and the new Amaravathi ayacut was formed only for agricultural purposes, he added.
He submitted that as per the 1984 regulations, priority should be given to fulfilling drinking water needs before irrigational needs. But the said regulations were not being followed by the authorities for the past two years. They issued a press statement on June 18 that they would be releasing water to the tune of 224.64 cubic feet for a period of five days from June 19 to 23 for the drinking water needs of Dharapuram municipality. However, no water was released, leading to several demonstrations by the municipality.
Meanwhile, he wrote to the authorities on July 16 to open the main channel of the dam in the old ayacut for drinking water purposes. But instead, the authorities issued a GO on July 20 stating that they were going to release 440 cubic feet of water in the new Amaravathi ayacut for irrigation purposes from July 21 to August 5 for a period of 15 days. As of now, the water in Amaravathi dam is nearly 53 feet (2384 million cubic feet). If the water is released as per the above G.O., there may be a possibility of drinking water scarcity in Karur, the litigant alleged and sought the above relief.
A bench of justices CV Karthikeyan and R Sakthivel issued notice to the authorities concerned and sought a report by the next hearing on July 29.