Mangaluru: T V Ramachandra, co-coordinator EWRG-CES, IISc Bangalore, said, there is actually no water crisis in Bengaluru, but the problem is in its water management.

“In reality, Bengaluru receives 740 to 850 mm rainfall annually. If we quantify this water it makes 15 TMC of water, whereas Bengaluru requires 18 TMC of water. That means 70% of water required for the city is available here itself.

So, there is no need to divert either Sharavathi, nor Netravathy or Yettinahole in the name of water scarcity in Bengaluru,” he said addressing the gathering after releasing technical report on “Carrying capacity of Nethravathy river basin based on ecological sensitiveness” at Pre-Lake 2018 conference on “Sustainable management of global water resources: Need and Challenges’ jointly organized by Alva’s Education Foundation and EWRG-CES IISc Bangalore, in Moodbidri on Friday.

The type of urbanization taking place in past five decades in Bengaluru is disastrous. Unplanned urbanization is killing Bengaluru, he added.

He said, “rain water harvesting is the best option to restore water, along with roof top harvesting and collectively through the lakes.

He added and said when you do the rain water harvesting, the ground water recharge takes place and that is what the Bengaluru decision makers should think off, rather than diverting river Nethravathy to here.

” He asked how long the people of Uttara Kannada and Dakshina Kannada could be abused.

“Nethravathy river basin water yielding capacity is sufficient to this region. But if you divert, it will yield trouble in the scarcity of water in this region. We need to develop the mindset of questioning the system, instead of keeping mum,” he added.

“People say rainfall is declining in Kolar and Chikkballapur region, but when we did a study on 118 years rainfall trend data analysis, it shows there is no decline of rainfall.

But actually, there is decline in sensible thinking and it is causing the problem, he noted.

Russian delegate Nickolai Filatov, Scientific Advisor and Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, National water Problems Institute (NWPI), Petrozavodsk, Alexander Gelfan, Deputy Director, Doctor of Science, Russian academy of Sciences, Shamil Raufovich Pozdniakov , Director, Dr Institute of Limnology , Saint Petersburg, Tatjana Ivanoivna Regerand , Research Secretary , Russian Academy of Sciences and Rajshekar Murthy, Emeritus, Environment Canada delivered talks.