Mumbai: Leaky pipes give civic body nightmares

  • | Thursday | 21st February, 2019

Even the shortage of staff in water detection squad made the problem worse in the background of 10 per cent water cut. Only 42 per cent of water remains in the water reservoirs which supply water to the city. About 24 per cent of the total water supply in the commercial capital is unmetered. As per records, the civic body recorded 20 per cent non-revenue water (NRW) in 2009. 10 years later, the civic body is still fighting the menace while the percentage of water loss has jumped by 7 per cent.

Although Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has been trying to lay new pipelines network in the various part of the city to tackle with the leakage and contamination, the civic body is still struggling to keep leakages below 20 per cent of the total supply. Even the shortage of staff in water detection squad made the problem worse in the background of 10 per cent water cut. Only 42 per cent of water remains in the water reservoirs which supply water to the city. The BMC has already imposed 10 per cent water cut. On the other hand, there are various complaints about pipeline leakages across the city. During the winter session, the state government told the state Legislative Assembly that around 24,654 leaks were detected and fixed in the last year across the city. About 24 per cent of the total water supply in the commercial capital is unmetered. The figure is more than the national average of 15 per cent. In other words, approximately 700 million litre water remained unaccounted of the 3800 million litre water supplied to the city every day. Leakages, unauthorised connections, water theft and metering inaccuracies were some of the reasons for the high percentage of unmetered water supply. Ideally, the loss percentage should not be more than 15 per cent of the total supply. As per records, the civic body recorded 20 per cent non-revenue water (NRW) in 2009. With the help of digitisation and GPS, the aim was to reduce it to 15 per cent. 10 years later, the civic body is still fighting the menace while the percentage of water loss has jumped by 7 per cent. "In the last two months, numerous incidents of leakages and technical issues had been reported in Kalina itself. However, with insufficient and inefficient manpower, repair work is taking more than the usual time," said Crompton Texeira, an activist who has been voluntarily detecting leakages for the past 15 years. "The problem lies in the shortage of staff in the leakage detection squad which helps detect leakages and repair them immediately with the help of the squad. But there are not many employees to do this job and water gets wasted in leakages," said Rais Sheikh, group leader of Samajwadi Party. The BMC hydraulic engineer was unavailable for comment.

If You Like This Story, Support NYOOOZ

NYOOOZ SUPPORTER

NYOOOZ FRIEND

Your support to NYOOOZ will help us to continue create and publish news for and from smaller cities, which also need equal voice as much as citizens living in bigger cities have through mainstream media organizations.


Stay updated with all the Mumbai Latest News headlines here. For more exclusive & live news updates from all around India, stay connected with NYOOOZ.

Related Articles