Not a drop to drink in 500 villages in Maharashtra

At present, 3,798 villages in the state have no source of potable water, state supplying water from tankers

The water situation in the state is worse than ever, with around 500 villages going completely dry in the past 15 days. They have no source of water and the state government is providing them potable water from tankers.

Villagers fetch water from a well filled by a tanker in Thakrechi Wadi village at Shahapur Taluka in Thane district. (Praful Gangurde)

With this, the number of villages relying on tankers for water supply has gone up to 3,798. This is the first time such large number of tankers are supplying water across the state.

And this is not where the woes end. Officials from the relief and rehabilitation department fear a more disturbing picture in days to come as the water stock in the state is depleting rapidly owing to the rise in temperatures.

The situation in Marathwada (central Maharashtra) is worst, with 2,503 villages getting water from tankers.

According to the data compiled by the relief and rehabilitation department, the number of tankers supplying drinking water has now reached up to 4,883 as against 4,356 on April 18.

The water stock in dams in the Marathwada region has also gone down to 2%, which adds to the concerns, a senior official said. Of 11 major dams in the region, eight including Jayakwadi, have zero live water storage at present, the official added.

A closer look at the figures shows the highest number of tankers — 866 — has been pressed in the Beed, followed by Aurangabad [758] and Ahmednagar, with and 703 tankers respectively, are the second and third highest number of tankers respectively.

The government has to supply drinking water through tankers at several places in 27 out of 34 districts. The total number of tankers deployed this time last year was 1,814, which is one third of the current number.