A vast expanse of land at Thervoy Kandigai, where cattle graze now, will soon become the fifth reservoir to meet the drinking water needs of the Chennai city.

A little distance from the Sipcot industrial park at Thervoy Kandigai in Tiruvallur district, the reservoir was coming up on 1,100 acres of land, where nearly 300 labourers with 60 large equipment were on job to create a 14-metre tall bund, covering 7.1 km long stretch, to store water.

Sources in the Water Resources Department said 95 per cent of the work had been completed. Had not the residents of Kannankottai resisted the move to build the bund for a distance of 1.6 km, the project would have been over by now. Of the nearly 1,485 acres needed for the reservoir, about 800 acres of patta land had been acquired. Following protests from 50 farmers in Kannankottai, the bund formation work could not be carried out. Interim compensation had already been deposited in the court.

Sources said that located about 60 km north of Chennai, the reservoir was being created by merging Thervoy Kandigai Periya eri and Kannankottai eri. The waterbody had been designed to store nearly 1,000 million cubic feet of water when filled twice. While the rest of the civil works would be over by the end of this month, the creation of the bund in Kannankottai would determine the time it took for the entire project to be completed. The bund formation work would take another two months and was expected to be completed early next year, the sources added.