Property Plus
Bangalore
Chennai
Hyderabad
Kochi
Malabar
Thiruvananthapuram
WATER WISE
For safe water
S. VISWANATH
Come summer and most Indian cities start reporting gastro-enteritis and cholera. In Bangalore this has happened in the month of January itself with both the problems already in. Residents think that it is the contaminated mains supply from the Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB) that is the source of the gastro-enteritis.
BWSSB thinks it is water bought by residents from the private water tankers that is the cause, but seems to have changed its mind later. An engineer has been suspended for carelessness and the residents are demonstrating in front of the head office of the service provider.
It is feared that the cause may be the mix up of sewage and water and its absorption into the water lines or it may be contaminated water from other sources such as private tankers or borewells.
What accounts for the real problem
The real issue is the complete inability of institutions in urban India to cover the entire city with their network and keep the water lines fully pressured and supply made available 24 hours a day. It is also the lack of accountability of the institutions for the quality of water delivered with residual chlorine levels as specified, which creates the problem. A re-look is needed at the entire structure of water supply in the city and the endemic problems addressed, else we will face the same health issue arising time and again.
The leakage in the distribution network of old water pipes is enormous and of the order of 40 per cent in typical Indian cities. Pipes have not been replaced or upgraded in many places.
The sewage system is defunct. Sewage is neither fully collected in a proper manner nor is it treated. People are not paying the true price for water and sewage collection and treatment and subsidies are mis-targeted. It costs the BWSSB Rs.18 to produce a kilo-litre of water and it supplies the first slab at Rs.6 a kilo-litre to even the richest houses in Bangalore.
If the rich don’t pay the true price for water and financially strengthen institutions, the poor will pay with their health as in this particular outbreak suggests. More money will be spent on water filters and assorted treatment devices for water than in setting the system right.
Unregulated private water supply
A typical private water tanker has a 4,000 litre capacity load that costs Rs.150. One such leaking tanker delivers water untested for quality to a family. The family has to buy water because there is a function in the house and the mains supplied water has run out. A sump built to receive the mains water, which comes once in two days for two hours, is all set to receive the tanker water this time.
A borewell about 525 ft. deep is the source of the tanker water. It has a 7.5 HP pump and it takes 15 minutes to fill the tanker. The tankers operate in a zone of two km. The firm has three tankers and altogether on an average day supplies 30 loads in a day, making for 1,20,000 litres daily.
The first borewell that the firm dug went dry and so the second one, deeper of course, supplies the water. The tanker water provider has no system of checking for water quality. There is no regulation of tanker water by any authority. Yet they are doing a service. They are providing water to families in need which the city cannot deliver.
If only private water tanker owners and operators are educated on the methods of checking water quality and adopting simple chlorination to the water they deliver! Knowing that a residual chlorine of 0.2 ppm is essential would be enough. Even people who buy this water can chlorinate it using bleaching powder.
Checking for residual chlorine is easy and requires a small kit called a chloroscope. Spreading such water literacy is crucial to the public health of our cities.
Key questions emerge
Why should not the water supply institutions provide enough water for the citizens? Why should not water be a 24/7 supply in our pipes and with sufficient pressure to reach higher floors? Why don’t citizens demand better service from their service providers? Even when we have gastro-enteritis in the city why do we not look for structural improvements in water supply and sanitation for the whole of the city? Urban India, please wake up and smell the coffee.
The author can be contacted at 23641690 www.rainwaterclub.org; www.arghyam.org; www.indiawaterportal.org; www.ircsa.org; www.voicesfromthewaters.com
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Thiruvananthapuram
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