Water crisis: Hotels & mansions shut; IT firm sends employees home; CM holds meeting

Hotels, mansions, and residents in the Chennai could not withstand the deepening water crisis in the city as there seems no respite for their woes. However, Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami and his ministers had a review meeting at the secretariat to take stock of the situation and measures to resolve the water crisis. Most of the hotels and mansions have started to shut as they could not meet the water needs.

Speaking to The Federal, S Kiruba Shree, residing in a hostel in the OMR IT corridor, said she was asked to vacate the hostel as they could not provide water. “The company where I work has asked us to work from home and told that they may call at any day for a review meeting. If there is no water in the company and also in the hostel, I am not sure what to do. We cannot go to our native place as the project manager might call us anytime for a review meeting,” she said. “A few other girls, who stayed in the same hostel have started to vacate as there is no drinking water also,” she added.

According to R Shruthi, a native of Coimbatore, “Even during normal days, we get drinking water in a can. But, now they agents who put water can have also stopped distributing it, citing the demand for water. We have no other option rather than to move to our native.”

Similarly, the restaurants in Teynampet and surrounding areas in Chennai have reduced the operational hours due to the water scarcity. According to a private restaurant owner, until a week ago, they managed to get the water by spending about 30% of their revenue. “As days passed, water lorries have started to increase the price and we were forced to spend about 50% of the total revenue for water alone,” added the owner. The hotelier said, they are open for morning breakfast and night dinner timing alone skipping lunch time.

While some hotels that had regular customers had no other option rather than to reduce the operational timing, but a few who do not have a regular customer and had passing crowds shut the establishments, M Ramkumar, owner of a small hotel in Teynampet, cited the reason for the shutdown.

The opposition party DMK took up the issue and leader MK Stalin sought the resignation of the Municipal Administration Minister SP Velumani as he failed to resolve the people water woes. In a damage control mode to the raising water crisis across the state, the state government ordered a water body restoration project worth ₹500 crore.

Taking stock of the situation, on Monday (June 17) Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami along with his ministers and municipal administration officials held a review meeting on the measures being taken up to solve the water scarcity.