(MENAFN- Gulf Times) India's tech hub Bengaluru may soon run out of water like Cape Town in South Africa, which is facing a severe water crisis, the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) said yesterday.
'Bengaluru is one of the 10 metropolitan cities in the world that are quickly moving towards ‘Day Zero' (when the cities will completely run out of water), said a CSE statement quoting a study by its Down To Earth magazine.
Beijing (China), Mexico City (Mexico), Sanaa (Yemen), Nairobi (Kenya), Istanbul (Turkey), Sao Paulo (Brazil), Karachi (Pakistan), Buenos Aires (Argentina) and Kabul (Afghanistan) are the other nine cities that may soon run out of water, the study said.
While the number of water bodies in Bengaluru has reduced by 79% due to unplanned urbanisation and encroachment, the built-up area has gone up from 8% in 1973 to 77%, it said.
According to the study, the city's water table went down from 10-12m to 76-91m in 20 years, while the extraction wells have gone up from 5,000 to 450,000 in 30 years owing to increasing population.
The city's over 10mn population is estimated to reach 20.3mn by 2031, growing 3.5% annually, the study said.
'Bengaluru uses only half of its treatment capacity to treat waste and a substantial amount (of waste) is dumped into its water bodies, it noted.
Cape Town, one of the richest cities in South Africa, has been facing an extreme water shortage since 2017, with a below-average rainfall since 2015 that has dried up the city's reservoirs.
Experts estimate Cape Town will reach 'Day Zero within a few months, when the city's taps will go dry, forcing citizens to collect water rations from trucks for daily use.
Bengaluru, too, has been facing water shortage in several of its suburbs with severely polluted lakes.
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