Bengaluru Tanker Economy: BWSSB make a major call to cut down water supply by 20per cent to the most important consumers in Bengaluru, Karnataka state capital on March 12, 2024. These include; companies, hospitals, railways and airport.
This decision has been made at a strategic meeting with large number of customers with connections from BWSSB. BWSSB Chairman V Ram Prasat Manohar conducted the meeting.
As from the 15th of March, the Board’s Cauvery water supply will be gradually reduced by an average of between 1% and 20%.
Manohar stressed that around 0.3 million people with large water connections in Bengaluru have to bear this decision for the overall benefit of the 14 million citizens of the city.
Before, the Board has been delivering water to large consumers at prices that are between 95% to 100% of their allocation. However, with the implementation of the reduction measure, now a 20 per cent cut in water supply is reduced to overcome the existing water problem in Bengaluru.
Bengaluru Tanker Economy
The BWSSB has also released a detailed list which shows which parts of Bengaluru are worst affected by water shortages. Thus, 257 regions of four zones of Garden City have been defined as affected by the water shortage problem most.
The affected regions include:
- Bengaluru South Zone: HSR Layout, bommanahalli, Hoskerehalli, Chickpet, and Yelachenahalli
- Bengaluru West Zone: Rajajinagar 6th Block, Peenya, Bagalagunte and Bapujinagar.
- Bengaluru East Zone: Kr puram, Ramamurthy nagar and Marathahalli
- Bengaluru North: Devara Jeevanahalli and Vyalikaval.
Water Supply in Bengaluru
The latter came in the wake of recent statements by the Manohar-led KSPCB on adequate availability of the liquid in the city over the next five months. He had said that while the challenges persist, the estimated water requirement for the city for the coming period is 8 TMC and is fully implementable.
Manohar mentioned the fact that at the moment the city uses 10,450 ml of water in the river of Cauvery. Also, there is one of the greatest reservoirs, Krishna Raja Sagara at Mandya district, supplying 34 TMC water from this river. Compared to the consumption forecast for the next five months, Bengaluru requires about eight TMC of water, the Cauvery supply is said to be adequate until July.
But with the recent announcement of March 12, the going only becomes worse for the people of Bengaluru. A Bengalurean uses 150 litres of water per day on average. This comes to a total requirement of 200000 million litres per day (mld) for the city.
Hardships galore ( Water mafia and politicians controls Water supply in Bengaluru )
The March 12 announcement is going to adversely affect the city further. From the above classification of consumers, it is apparent that some of the biggest consumers who will be impacted include hospitals.
Whether it be a big hospital or a small clinic, all are facing acute water shortage which present huge challenges to healthcare provision.
Due to this the hospitals have had to adopt the following measures to cushion it from the water problems as they continue being scarce. Some have begun using treated water targeted for flushing toilets, while others inquest about new borewells for water supply. However, they still largely continue to employ tanker water across the majority of the hospitals which only shows the extent of the problem.
Water Problem in Bengaluru’s Health Care Sector
This is the painful position explained by Dr B C Subramanya, the head of a private hospital in Ramamurthy Nagar though he observes that his hospital alone needs at least fifty thousand liters of water on a daily basis.
The only bore well on which this hospital depended is dry since a month and all we get is to rely on costly tanker water. They say though the government fixed charges for tanker water supply, they charge Rs 1,200-1,500 for 6,000 litres of water could not even supply that on time despite charging more, he added.
Likewise, yet another AH Referral healthcare institution situated at Bagalagunte reveals the problem of multiple sources of water supply drying up. Borewells even gave no water and BWSSB supply always a failure, now the entire working of this hospital depends only on tanker water and it increases the problem of logistics and money.
Water Problem in Bengaluru’s Local Areas
In addition to hospitals, water scarcity has affected crematoriums, graveyards as well as cemeteries and adds to the miseries of the families that has lost their dear once. I met families who, because of water shortages, could not bury their loved ones properly or even give them proper send-offs because many cultural events center on washing the body of the deceased.
According to another local’s account, crematoriums including the Rajajinagar Harishchandra Ghat, Sumanahalli Crematorium, Wilson Garden and the TR Mill Crematorium in Chamarajpet are the ones that suffer from this shortage that only makes it even harder for the suffering families.
With exams and assessments in full swing, schools in Bengaluru are facing a new challenge: Water scarcity. Most bourns that were drilled on school compounds have dried up and it becomes very hard to supply the students and staff with water especially during the classroom hours.
Water Problem in Bengaluru’s Education System
“The main problem is not drinking water but water for flushing,” said the principal of a school located in Vyalikaval area of Mysore. “Because of this, the shortage has become way worse, and many schools have taken to using drums containing water in toilets rather than using running tap water. He added, “We have asked the government to ensure supplies in schools get BWSSB water on priority basis.”
Another of the school teachers said that she was worrying for the next few weeks. This is a worrying development for private schools especially those in the peripheral areas, especially the newly affiliated villages of the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP in the year 2008).
These areas are mainly characterised by extreme water rationing. Many have no piped water at all Most never have piped water system in their homes. It seems the water shortage crisis has hit us at this critical time and we are now forced to use water tankers. Sadly, there are exams and assessments to be conducted and students cannot get a chance to rewrite or redo their work,” explained the teacher.
But as one will expect due to their small size, preschools are not as badly affected as regular schools are. “There is also another possibility that this crisis may in a way affect school fees since schools may shift the cost of solving the water problem to parents,” said the tutor.
BWSSB’s Action
However, the BWSSB has acted proactively towards control of wastage within the consumption of portable water in activities that are not necessary such as gardening and car washing.
In fact, in a recent announcement of BWSSB the usage of potable water for such purposes as car washing or watering plants is banned. Under the new directives people found utilizing drinking water for non-sanctioned purposes will have to pay a penalty of Rs 5,000.
The notification that has been issued by the BWSSB has not only created appreciable concern among the residents of the city.
A resident of K R Puram in Bengaluru East, BM Ramesh admitted to use Cauvery water for domestic and horticultural necessities since there is no other source of water he can turn to.
While ground water continues to be a common property resource and there is no individual bore well in his local area, he has no option other than using scarce drinking water for his plants, he said this to this reporter.
A resident of Dodda Bomma, Sandra̧ Vijay Prakash said that it made him want to know more about the course of action taken looking at monitoring usage of drinking water. “Are they staffed enough for that? The government should escalate first for the wise use of water,” he said.
To address the problem, which has been a temporary measure, the federal government has offered to register water tankers with an offer to have the registration deadline brought forward to March 15.
This is because with 1530 private tankers already registered on the BBMP portal, the authorities expect many more to register before the deadline.
Mild to moderate water problem is expected to affect the next set of old Bengaluru municipal areas comprising residential individual houses such as Yeshwanthpura, Rajajinagar, Vijayanagar, Jayanagar, Malleshwaram, Hanumanth Nagar and Basavanagudi. “This shows that the BWSSB operates in a manner that favours the ‘tanker mafia’,” he said.
The BWSSB has been implementing several projects to mitigate water shortage situation as follows. But all efforts turn ugly as long as there is this tanker mafia.
Water Problem in Bengaluru’s Residential Areas
Numerous residents in different neighborhood’s of Bengaluru testify to being ‘held captive’ by these operators who overcharge for a basic necessity; water. A standard 12000 litre tanker ranges from Rs 1200 to Rs 3000 to transport depending with the urgency and the area. It may become expensive during the dry season or when the BWSSB’s supply is low is because, روستا.
In confidence, this author spoke with a tanker fleet owner who specialises in water transportation the reveals the following; the city’s water supply ward level engineers have their own cartel, the cartel decides who will invest in a tanker and how many trips the investor can make in a season.
“They themselves are related to the corporator of the ward, the higher officials and the prominent political leaders. Each tanker costs around Rs 50-55 lakh has invested in the plant and machinery to do the work properly. The owners, some of whom are in debts to banks, if there isn’t a water scarcity, then we are also saying the owners will not make income and therefore cannot service the bank debts. This is why they have to partake in the ‘artificial water scarcity economy’ in Bengaluru,” said the tanker fleet owner.
Water mafia and politicians controls Water supply in Bengaluru
Currently more than 3,500 tankers have been registered in the Bengaluru Metropolitan Area, among them 1,499 tanker only used for transportation of water continuously for one year. The Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) has made it compulsory to upload correct vehicle details in an application designed for water tanker owners.
But BBMP data shows over 1,700 tankers registered until March 14, 2024. There is a clear disparity in the number of tankers in operation between the BBMP and the Regional Transport Commissionerate.
The quality of the water supplied is also in doubt. While the inner part of the tanker shall be coated with ethoxylated polyethyleneimine to avoid rusting of the inside of the tank, many are not, and the water we end up consuming is lukewarm.
To prescribe such a path is to poke one’s finger in the eyes of Bengaluru’s water security, a BWSSB official, who does not wish to be named, said that he attended meetings between political leaders and the tanker mafia, as well as BWSSB and BBMP officials concerned with water supply.
“These meetings are but a charade; in the background, the tanker mafia is allowed to call the shots as to which water supply officials in the different wards should be dealt with, with the ultimate intention of stopping water.” The persons operating the valves of the pipelines are directed to either let water out every three days or turn the valve to a mere 30 per cent – this lets in just enough water for the taps but not enough to flood the underground sumps and overhead tanks,” the official revealed.
With no other choice they have to call the tankers.
The BWSSB has been trying to execute a variety of schemes to overcome the problem of water scarcity like lake recharging, rainwater harvesting buildings and structures regulation, and the Cauvery Water Supply Scheme etc. However, these are often overridden by the pace of growth of the city and hampered by officialdom.
Due to inadequate infrastructure, the BWSSB can currently supply only about 900 million litres of water per day while the demand in city is about 1.5 billion litres. This gap has made it possible for the water tanker industry to grow to become very large even though this business is not regulated in many places around the world.
The crisis is galvanising citizens’ groups and NGOs into action to a greater extent than before. Programs like save Bangalore’s Lakes and Borewell Recharging Projects have been started to attempt to recharge the groundwater of Bangalore and minimize the usage of water tankers. However, the following grassroots efforts clearly show that more extensive and structural changes are required.
Increase of the extra judicial activities of the water tanker mafia has raised the demand for better regulation and proper implementations. The scholars are of the view that there is a need for efficient public water management alongside extraction controls, which imply for the political will democracy and subsequent necessity.
Securing water source for growing population of Bengaluru is important as city is transforming itself into global city. It is not the bare rights of the city and its inhabitants to get water from the water tanker mafia, but it is for regaining the future of the city as per the civil society of the city.
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