BWSSB focus on manholes

BWSSB focus on manholes
Deccan Herald

With rains round the corner and bitter memories of last year’s monsoons still fresh, the civic agencies have all got on their foot, to undertake precautionary measures.

While the Bangalore Mahanagara Palike has begun the mammoth task to clean up storm water drains, the Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB) has focussed attention on the one lakh odd manholes in the City.

Beginning Monday, over 1,000 members divided into six teams will take on the cleaning process in the six BWSSB divisions with the help of 25 jetting machines, at a cost of Rs 2 crore. BWSSB has contracted over 1,000 sanitary workers for this purpose.

“We have identified the low lying areas which reported flooding last year. Of the one lakh manholes in the City, we found around 40,000 to be problematic. It is these manholes which we will be targetting over the next 10 days for desilting,” said BWSSB Chairman N C Muniyappa. Once the manhole is desilted, the waste will be directly shifted to the BWSSB treatment plants, he added.

The areas where work will be in progress include Puttenahalli, HSR Layout, BTM Layout, Avenue Road, Balepet, Chamarajpet and others, he said. In a public message, the BWSSB has also appealed to the public not to dump garbage and waste into the manholes and to ensure free flow of water.

This is the first time that BWSSB has undertaken the cleaning as a precautionary measure.

Earlier, the desilting work used to be done based on individual complaints, he added.