Sew it up: a murky tale of burgeoning muck

November 05, 2013 12:23 am | Updated November 16, 2021 08:50 pm IST - HYDERABAD:

Too little water and too much sewerage to treat. That is the challenging task the city faces. Residents in the GHMC area get an average of 340 mgd water everyday, and in turn they generate 1,400 mld sewerage.

But, the Hyderabad Metropolitan Water Supply and Sewerage Board (HMWSSB) is able to treat only 614 mld at its five sewerage treatment plants.

In other words, more than half the sewerage remains untreated and gets disposed of in drains and water bodies.

The Amberpet STP treats 339 mld; Nallacheruvu, 30 mld; Nagole, 172 mld; Necklace Road, 20 mld, and Attapur, 53 mld. Worse, only 80 per cent of the core GHMC area has sewerage network, while the peripheral areas merged into the Corporation have no network at all.

No regular supply

In fact, there is no regular and adequate water supply and sewerage network in the erstwhile 12 surrounding municipalities where the population has increased by 70 per cent in the last one decade.

Even the existing network in the core areas of the city is old and inadequate to cater for the present population, officials admit.

The total length of sewerage network runs into massive 4,000 km comprising trunk sewers, laterals and sub mains, interception and diversion structures.

But, the number of sewerage connections is only 6.4 lakh when it should have been 9.0 lakh in accordance with the number of households.

The sewers were designed way back in 1931 to serve a population of 4.68 lakh and an area of 54 sq. km.

Today, with extensions carried out over a period of time, they are serving an ever burgeoning population of 78 lakh spread over 625 square km. under the GHMC jurisdiction.

The civic body maintains the sewerage outside the core area.

So, where do the city’s excreta goes? Of course, the city’s own river Musi turns into the biggest receptacle. The rest of the waste goes into other lakes and water bodies.

That is the murky tale of the city muck.

Master plans

Now, ambitious master plans costing Rs. 3,195 crore for water supply and Rs. 1,920 crore to create a sewerage network are proposed for the surrounding municipal circles under Phase I and Phase II of JICA. Unfortunately, funds crunch has thrown spanner in the works.

The proposed water supply projects are: Alwal (Rs. 300 crore), Gaddiannaram (Rs. 56 crore), Kapra (Rs. 450 crore), Kukatpally (Rs. 361 crore), L.B. Nagar (Rs. 441 crore), Patencheru (Rs. 73 crore), Qutbullapur (Rs. 510 crore), Rajendra Nagar (Rs. 100 crore), R.C. Puram (Rs. 87 crore), Serilingampally (Rs.595 crore) and Uppal (Rs. 222 crore).

Under JNNURM Phase I, rehabilitation and strengthening of sewerage system in the Old City Zone I and Zone II are taken up at a cost of Rs. 148.81 crore and Rs. 251.25 crore, respectively. Work on a sewerage master plan at Serlingampally (Rs. 200.38 crore) and improvement of water supply distribution network and implementation of sewerage master plan at Rajendra Nagar (Rs. 314.26 crore) is also in progress. The Water Board needs Rs. 700 crore to complete the work before March 2014.

Sewerage work in the remaining four zones of the city and the peripheral municipal circles are proposed to be taken up in JNNURM Phase II.

“A minimum of Rs. 5,000 crore is required to execute these works,” says J. Syamala Rao, Managing Director, HMWSSB.

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.