PUNE: The Pune Municipal Corporation started drawing water from the Khadakwasla dam through a pipeline from Thursday, springing hope of saving 1 TMC of the precious natural resource annually. Completed in around three years’ time, the pipeline between Khdakwasla and Parvati water works was inaugurated on Thursday.
PMC officials said the civic administration was drawing water from the open canal.
The canal is not in a good condition which had led to water loss through evaporation and leakages. The closed pipeline would plug these losses.
PMC spent around Rs 200 crore on the 12-km-long pipeline project. "Around 1 TMC water can be saved in a year's time if the water is brought to the city through a closed pipeline. The trial of water supply was taken for three days. After the inauguration the city’s water supply was started via pipeline," the water department officials said.
The foundation stone of the second phase of closed pipeline from the Parvati water works to the Cantonment water works was also laid same day. The second phase of this works, which started on Thursday would be competed in around 1.6 year’s time. The administration has to lay 6 km pipeline. Nearly Rs 100 crore will be spent on this project now. After completion of the project, PMC will stop lifting water from canal. A around 1.5 TMC water will be saved once both the pipelines will become operational.