Pune: Politicians in an all-party committee meeting in the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) on Monday discussed the feasibility of artificial rains for Pune, if the water supply situation worsens, and told the civic administration to explore the possibility.Pune mayor Manjusha Nagpure told reporters: “Water supply and availability in the dams were reviewed in the meeting. The civic administration was instructed to seek details about experimenting with artificial rains in Baramati.”The mayor said the dams hold only 3.6 TMC (thousand million cubic feet) of water, currently. The stock is barely enough to last two months. “The monsoon is yet to pick up pace in the catchment area of the Khadakwasla dam despite June drawing to a close. The city will face a severe water crisis if the dams do not fill up this year. In order to ensure sufficient water availability, all-party floor leaders discussed whether artificial rain could be induced on an experimental basis,” she said.Nagpure said the civic commissioner’s office has been directed to submit a detailed report addressing several key aspects — locations where artificial rain experiments have been carried out in India earlier, whether those were successful, reputable institutions that could be approached for assistance, success rate of artificial rain, expected costs and whether Pune’s requirements could be met by inducing artificial rain across the chain of dams supplying water.During the meeting, instructions were also issued to the municipal administration to take immediate action to conserve water. Last week, the PMC had ordered to shut down washing centres and swimming pools, while banning use of drinking water for construction activities.
