The Indian Overseas Bank Officers’ and Retired Officers’ Housing Cooperative Society has denied allegations of groundwater depletion raised by residents of the Nellikode Housing Colony after the society’s apartment complex came up on the adjacent plot.
Responding to an article ‘Clean water is no longer a given in Nellikode Colony’ which was published in this daily on September 28, P. Chandran, secretary of the society, claimed that allegations of depletion in water level, pungent smell and muddy water in wells, were false and were aimed at influencing decision in a court case. The society, in a press release, termed it mischievous to blame them for the low water-level.
He claimed that all norms had been followed in drawing water from the well in their compound. He said that the society had applied to the Groundwater Department to conduct a yield test to advise them on the quantity of water they could draw without causing depletion in water-level depletion in neighbourhood. The department advised that they could draw 20,000 litres a day. As the Nellikode Housing Colony Allottees’ Association protested saying that the yield test was not done during peak summer, a retest was done and they were advised to draw 12,000 litres a day. Water was being brought in tanker lorries for use beyond the permitted limits, he said.
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Mr. Chandran also claimed that the association had prevented the society’s attempt to draw water pipelines through the road, claiming it was a private road.
As for the sewage treatment plant, the treated water was sent to the Centre for Water Resource Development and Management (CWRDM) to be certified pure. A chlorine injection pump had been attached to the STP and the open well was disinfected using bleaching powder as per the directions of the CWRDM, he said.