The Hindu            26.12.2011

Metered, regular water supply in 96 city slums soon

Afshan Yasmeen

Residents of 96 slums in Bangalore will soon have access to regular drinking water and a systematic underground drainage system.

Scaling
up its AusAID Master Plan Project that was implemented between 2000 and
2002, the Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB) has now
roped in four non-governmental organisations (NGOs) to mobilise
community support for connecting the city’s 362 slums with drinking
water and sanitary lines.

The AusAID project had covered three slums of Cement Huts, Sudhamanagar and Chandranagar.

Being
taken up as a slum development component under the Japan International
Cooperation Agency (JICA)-funded Cauvery II Stage IV Phase Project, this
effort is to ensure that slum dwellers are not deprived of piped water
and sanitation.

BWSSB Engineer-in-Chief T. Venkataraju told
The Hindu
here on Sunday that inadequate services to the urban poor were posing a
major challenge to the board in terms of unauthorised connections and
related problems.

The NGOs were entrusted with the
task of convincing the slum dwellers and mobilising their support for
metered connections. The NGOs have completed conducting socio-economic
and technical surveys in 96 slums under the first phase, he said.

“They
are likely to submit a preliminary report in a day or two after which
we will finalise and start the process of implementing the project in
these 96 slums. While the house connections, including pipelines,
accessories and water meters, will be provided free, the slum dwellers
will have to pay for the quantity of water they use after the supply
starts,” Mr. Venkataraju said.

He said that based on
the NGOs report, the water board could even consider further subsidising
water tariff for these communities. The supply will start soon after
the completion of the Cauvery II Stage IV Phase Project, he said.

The
four NGOs, Mythri Sarva Seva Samithi, Indian Community Development
Service Society, New Entity for Social Action and Mahatma Gandhi Trust,
were chosen from among 120 organisations through a tendering process, he
said.

Survey

Chief
Engineer (Cauvery) Narayan said that the job of the NGOs was to conduct a
door-to-door survey to find out the socio-economic status of the
family. “The survey is also to find out whether the family had access to
safe drinking water, how much money they spent on water and whether
they were ready to get metered connections installed at their doorstep,”
he explained.

Quoting a recent study by CIVIC in 23
city slums, S. Harish Babu of Mythri Sarva Seva Samithi said that the
study had revealed that collecting water was a major problem for slum
dwellers. “Hence, individual connections will help,” he said.

Clarifying
that the NGOs were not working for enhancing the water board’s revenue
by propagating metered connections, Mr. Babu said: “Our job is to
explain to the residents the ground reality. We are even trying to
persuade the board to fix a highly subsidised tariff slab for slum
connections,” he added.