The Hindu        29.11.2011

MCC to conduct survey of water connections

Huge gulf between listed connections and the actual buildings

Mangalore City Corporation has proposed to conduct a comprehensive survey to list and document water connections in its jurisdiction.

The Standing Committee for Taxation, Finance and Appeals at the corporation which met on Saturday approved the proposal and decided to conduct the survey by dividing 60 wards into six zones, according to the chairman of the committee Sharat Kumar.

Mr. Kumar told The Hindu on Monday that the committee decided to entrust the survey to six agencies which would be selected by inviting bids. He said that water section at the corporation had a list of 75,000 connections. But according to door numbers issued by the corporation, there were 1.60 lakh establishments (buildings). Of these all may not have water connections . But the vast mismatch has forced the corporation to propose for a survey as the civic body was incurring loss in terms of water revenue.

The chairman said the scope of the survey would mainly cover finding out illegal connections, authorised connections waiting to get sequence number, and connections without any problems.

The chairman said that some people had availed water connections by following due procedure. But the civic body was yet to give them sequence number for the billing purpose.

Mr. Kumar said the committee did not agree to a proposal of authorising a non-governmental organisation to conduct the survey.

Incidentally, when a subject on the proposal came before the corporation council (elected body) in its meeting last month, the council referred the subject to the Standing Committee.

Meanwhile, a senior official told The Hindu that since the committee had approved the proposal, the corporation would shortly invite bids to select the agencies for the survey.

The corporation official said the scope of the survey would cover finding out whether all establishments had access to underground drainage network.