Jala Mitra suffers setback

Jala Mitra suffers setback
Deccan Herald

At least eight civic bodies that were hoping for quality water with the implementation of the ambitious Jala Mitra project in July 2005 are terribly disappointed.

The project, jointly undertaken by the Karnataka Urban Infrastructure Development Corporation (KUIDC), Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB) and the people’s movement Janaagraha, was to better the water and sewerage system in seven CMCs and one TMC.

Ensuring people’s participation in their water supply and sanitation schemes was an important aspect of the project.

Around Rs 300 crore was the project outlay for this under the ‘Greater Bangalore’ scheme and resources from various international banks including the World Bank were mobilised for this purpose. But, all this is to no avail.

In January this year, the Janaagraha group pulled out of the project. Explaining the reasons for the pullout, Janaagraha co-founder Ramesh Ramanathan told Deccan Herald that he did not find the government very committed to the people’s participation clause of the project.

People fed up

Meanwhile it is found that the Byatrayanapura CMC is a case in example, where people are already fed up with the project. Work on water supply has taken place in only about 16 wards out of the total 31 wards. About 135 kms of pipeline has been laid and the CMC has already paid the BWSSB Rs 135 crore for this. Besides water, even basic amenities have not been provided to several places in this ward. Bad roads and lack of proper garbage disposal system have made life worse for the residents of Byatrayanapura.

Nothing has changed

Despite repeated complaints against the officials nothing really has changed for them. Last year the Department of Mines and Geology conducted a study on the quality of the ground water.

In its report, it stated that the ground water in around 58 per cent of the area was severely polluted.

The report also stated that the ground water in Hennur Layout had bacterial content.

Residents further complained that the CMC has been hiking the property tax, which has risen five folds over the past few years. But, basic amenities like roads, drains, street lights, garbage collection etc are still to see the light of the day. When contacted, CMC Commissioner Chandrashekhar Dashwanth blamed the BWSSB for the delay in implementing the Jala Mitra project.

Regarding garbage collection, he said that regular door to door garbage collection was already taking place under the ‘Zero Garbage’ scheme and that an NGO had been roped in by the CMC to spread awareness among the residents about garbage disposal.