The Deccan Chronicle 13.10.2010
Tech glitch hits city water supplyOct. 12: The call centre at the Bengaluru Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB) has been flooded with complaints as several parts of the city did not get water as major water supply pumps were shut last week due to technical glitches.
The BWSSB has received complaints regarding shortage of water from areas across the city including Marathahalli, Vidyaranyapuram,Girinagar, Cottonpet, Chikpet and Cubbonpet. The glitch occurred last Thursday and continued on Friday. The pumps at the Cauvery fourth stage 1st phase were shut down due to technical problems and the valves remained closed between 3 pm and 11 pm on October 7. According to chief engineer of the Cauvery project Narayan, “The board had already began work on Cauvery fourth stage, second phase but the censor rod had fallen from the 1st phase work, and the flow metre was arrested leading to a leak in the cover valve.”
While the engineers fixed the problem on Thursday, the problems resurfaced on Friday, October 8, and the pumps were shut once again at 11 am and it took the engineers another 10 hours to fix the glitch. As the pumps were shut for two days in a row, the BWSSB, which usually supplies 900 mld of water per day, was short of 120 mld on Friday and again on Sunday, it was short of 100 mld of water. The other source of water — the TG Halli reservoir — contains merely 19 feet of water as against the 30 feet of water it had last year. The reservoir provides just18 MLD of water.
As both TG Halli and Cauvery projects were not providing water at their maximum capacity, several areas in the city did not get water. Water is supplied in many parts of the city only every alternate day and these places suffered the most. The areas include the BTM layout, JP Nagar, Vidyaranyapuram, Domlur, Hoodi, Rajajinagar and Nagarbhavi.
Meanwhile, BWSSB chief engineer Venkatraju claimed that water supply had been restored. “The supply of water has been resumed and the board has sent 45 tankers of water to areas that were worst hit by the recent shortage,” he said.
