For weeks now, the southern Indian metropolis of Chennai - which people in that country like to call the Detroit of India for its many car manufacturing companies - has been afflicted with a monstrous water crisis. Hotels are installing flow governors on taps, some reportedly have even restricted servings of the watery lentil soup, sambar, so popular in those parts.

As my colleague Nirmala Ganapathy reported last month, water supply from Metro Water, the local body that supplies drinking water, has plunged from 830 million litres a day to 525 million litres per day since June 1, after a third consecutive year of drought.