Recharged

The rains have been quite patchy this year; cyclone Vardah was an anomaly, one that gave the city more wind than water. The threat of the city going dry within a few weeks, if not days, appears very real. There was a bit of cloud today, and promise of showers over the weekend. If that happens, it would be a Godsend.

You might take a look at the Kapaleeswarar temple tank and wonder what the fuss is all about. If there is so much water here, the ground water levels must be pretty good - that sounds logical. But this tank has been nurtured carefully - in the early 2000s, when rainwater harvesting was made mandatory, the tank was re-done with a little bit of thought. The normally sandy bed of the tank was laid over with a foot-and-a-half of clayey soil, which has helped in retaining the water much better.

If you click on the picture and blow it up, you will notice that the lower steps of the mandapam are bare. We can probably breath a bit easier when they get covered up with water!

Saving water

It has been a little over a dozen years since the Tamil Nadu government amended the Chennai Metropolitan Area Groundwater (Regulation) Act of 1987. That amendment was carried through in a kind of tearing hurry, as the city's water reserves were almost exhausted. The law now required all buildings to ensure that they had made provisions for rainwater harvesting (RWH) and there was a phase of six months when the implementation was carried out vigourously. Buildings that passed muster had to have a notification indicating compliance displayed on their wall.

Most buildings displayed the notification in a discreet manner. Not this one, which has proudly proclaimed its status on this. For a moment, that basin seemed to be one of the components of the RWH process; but no, it is just a decorative piece - it doesn't even seem to hold the little bit of rainwater that has fallen into it!