Out of about 15 major and minor irrigation schemes in north Gujarat, not a single is full. Against the storage capacity of 69,129.99 million cubic feet (MCFT), the dams in north Gujarat have just 20,675.52 MCFT of water. This means just 30 per cent of water is present against full capacity. It is sure that north Gujarat will have to depend heavily on Narmada and bore water to meet the drinking water needs in coming months.

According to Water supply and water resources minister Nitin Patel “The situation is not satisfactory in north Gujarat. We will have to depend heavily on ground water and Narmada for drinking water needs. Farmers have already drawn required water from dams and check dams. Hence there would be no more drawing of water from dams.”

According to official data, there are 195 dams in the state, 11 are overflowing, 52 dams had water over 90 per cent of the storage capacity, while another 24 had over 80 per cent water. However, there were still 83 dams which have less then 40 per cent water. The remaining 36 dams have water between 80 and 40 per cent.

The data also revealed that the situation is alarming in Gujarat’s northern most district Banaskantha where dams have just 4.9 per cent water, followed by Surendranagar in Saurashtra with 21.25 per cent water. Dams of Ahmedabad district have 31.37 per cent water.

Official said that dams of Saurashtra and south Gujarat have 63 per cent water while those in central Gujarat have nearly 61 per cent water.