The election code of conduct has delayed the Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board’s ambitious initiative to sell water in tankers at a reasonable price this summer.

The move is aimed at preventing the private water sellers from charging exorbitant prices.

BWSSB Engineer-in-Chief T Venkataraju said, “Despite getting the new water tankers in time, we could not launch our programme to sell water at affordable prices to the people in the city as the elections were announced. As the code of conduct will be in force till May 15, we will have to seek the necessary permission from the new government  to launch this initiative.”

As there is a huge demand for water supplied in tankers, the BWSSB had procured 30 new tankers for selling the surplus water that is being pumped to the city from Cauvery IV Stage II Phase Drinking water project.

It is supposed to allot one tanker each to its 28 sub-divisions, exclusively for supplying water to the consumers who buy it directly by the ground level reservoirs in each sub-division.

The private tanker owners are charging Rs 500 for a tanker that can hold 4,000 litres of water. The BWSSB has also announced that it will charge Rs 360 for 6,000 litres of water as the tankers procured by it are bigger in size.

The BWSSB is already supplying water through its existing fleet of 35 tankers freely to the areas that do not receive adequate water supply.

Its move to sell water was expected to minimise the depletion of ground water levels as the private water suppliers are drawing more than 200 MLD of ground water leading to severe depletion of ground water levels.