The Hindu              31.12.2013

‘State has dropped plan to let sewage into Bhima’

Minister for Municipal Administration and Waqf Qamarul
Islam has said that the government has given up the idea of diverting
the sewage into the Bhima at a point near the Saradagi barrage, from
where the bulk water is lifted for providing drinking water. The sewage
would be impounded and treated before letting it into the river.

Presiding
over the quarterly review meeting of the Karnataka Development
Programme (KDP) here on Monday, Mr. Islam said that a team of experts
from Bangalore, deputed by the Karnataka Urban Water Supply and Drainage
Board, had visited the spot where the sewage mixed with the Bhima. The
team members had said that the proposal mooted by the board to divert
the water through a closed canal and allowing it to merge with the river
in the downstream of Saradagi barrage at a cost of Rs. 14 crore, would
not serve any purpose.

The threat to the health of
people drinking the water drawn from the Bhima would continue to remain.
The only solution was to treat the sewage before letting it into the
river. The State government had accepted the report of experts and
directed the KUWSDB to upgrade the existing oxidation plant, located
near the Bhima, into a sewage treatment plant, and allow only treated
sewage to flow into the Bhima, as a permanent solution. Mr. Islam said
that the government had also given its green signal to take up the work
on underground drainage (UGD) system in Aland and Wadi in Chittapur
taluk and drinking water project to Sedam. The district administration
had been directed to issue 4(1) notification for the acquisition of land
required for implementing these projects.

Aland MLA
B.R. Patil, who spoke on the issue, said that owing to non-availability
of suitable land, the UGD work sanctioned to Aland town could not be
taken up in time. Many projects sanctioned to taluk headquarters could
not be taken up for want of land. The government should create a land
bank with about 25 to 100 acres in and around all taluk headquarters for
taking up the projects, including the newly sanctioned schools,
hospitals and other infrastructure facilities, he said.