Daily water supply remains a pipe dream

A Mission Bhagiratha park developed on the premises of MCK water filter bed in Karimnagar. (Source: K.M. Dayashankar)

Supply of drinking water daily to the residents of Municipal Corporation of Karimnagar, which was promised by the elected representatives a decade ago, remains far fetched even during this summer season as people are struggling for water even as there is an increase in its consumption due to the soaring temperature.

Though the leaders have been talking about daily water supply scheme since 2009, it gained pace only after including Karimnagar in the Smart City programme in 2016. Later, the MCK officials along with the elected representatives toured Nagpur city to inspect the functioning of 24x7 water supply in the city.

Since October 2019, the authorities assured the people that water would be supplied daily from January 2020 onwards and later it was extended to April 2020. On the pretext of lockdown, it was further delayed. However, the trial run was launched on May 5 and the authorities promised to provide water daily within 10 days. But 20 days after the conduct of the trial run, the daily water supply remains a distant dream in the town.

Thanks to Kaleshwaram lift irrigation project, there is abundant water in the Lower Manair Dam (LMD) reservoir, the main source for Karimnagar’s drinking water scheme. Even in this hot summer, the LMD is having 8.5 tmcft of water against its capacity of 24 tmcft. Due to lockdown, the water consumption increased by 15 to 25 per cent in Karimnagar as people remained indoors.

“Leave about daily water supply, we are not getting adequate water supply due to low pressure,” said R Chandraprabhakar, a Karimnagar Consumer Council activist and resident of Mankammathota.

Jaya, a resident of Vasudeva Colony in Bhagatnagar, said that they hardly get water through the taps due to low pressure, but the municipal authorities force them to pay water bills. “Daily water supply is needed of the hour during the summer season and not in the rainy season,” she stated.

Accepting that there was a delay in fulfilling the promise of providing daily water supply, Karimnagar Mayor Y Sunil Rao assured that by the first week of June they can provide daily water supply.