Meanwhile, the PMC demand of increasing the water capacity for the city from Khadakwasla dam has been in principle approved by the state Irrigation department.

“The PMC has asked the irrigation department to increase the reserved water storage capacity for its drinking water supply from 12 TMC to 14 TMC and has got in principle approval,” said V G Kulkarni, Development Engineer, PMC Water Works.

The PMC’s earlier plan of getting water from Tulapur, where the Bhima, Bhama and Indrayani rivers come together, has come a cropper due to high water pollution.

“Tulapur is almost ruled out. The recent survey of water body by Unity Consultants appointed for identifying water resources for the city has revealed that the water from Tulapur is contaminated with organic and metallic pollutants and not good for drinking,” V G Kulkarni said. Also, to bring water from Tulapur river, situated 15 kms from the city, will cost PMC Rs 30 crore.

The sewage treatment plant of Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation (PCMC) located only two km from Tulapur combined with the waste generated by the Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC) was contaminating the water, he said.

This leaves the water resources department with two potential sources - Maval-Andhra and Bhama-Askhed dams. The laying of the 70-km water pipeline from Maval-Andhra basin will require an outlay of Rs 125 crore while the 50-km pipeline stretch from Bhama-Askhed will cost Rs 100 crore. The Maval-Andhra basis has a capacity of 7.86 TMC and Bhama-Askhed, 3.5 TMC.

While the PMC would have had to shell out Rs 3.5 a kilolitre for drawing water from Tulapur, the two newly identified basins will cost much less - only 17 paise per kilo litre. Though the total expenses seem to be too high for drawing water from the two new dams, Kulkarni said the cost could well be recovered in 10 years.