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Drinking water down the drain, Sewage water on the road

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psaram42 - 25 October, 2009 | Bangalore | BWSSB | Water | Citizen Reports | MLA | sewerage | Others | Everything else

 “If anything can go wrong, it will” Says Murphy’s Laws site. It is an Interesting site where all the laws of Murphy are put in one place. It may be worthwhile to browse it more.

BWSSB is no exception. BWSSB provides basic amenities like.

  1. Providing safe drinking water (DW)
  2. Safe Disposal of sewage water 

With the phenomenal growth of any city provision of these basic amenities is a challenging call. 

JJ colony is a slum at the corner of 100 ft and old madras road junction, in Indiranagar. It provides kattcha dwellings for the downtrodden people below the Poverty line, who are important for the upkeep of our city of Bangalore.

 

Picture-1. The Water tank inside the conjusted colony with a central tap.

This facility is now defunct. The water connection was never given to these taps or to the lone RCC Tank.

 

 

Picture-2. Full View of the tank. 

 

 

Picture-3 Another tap provided at the same spot.

The BSP leader with whome I had these discussions is seen in this picture above. He was vary with me, suspecting my intensions. However he was with me when I made my intentions clear.

 

Picture-4. Another example of non commisioned DW facility.

At present these taps are dry with no supply of DW.  

The leader of JJ colony a BSP party member (See Picture above) gave some info about how these developmental works taken up by the politicians on and off have failed to fructify. The water tank and the tap inside the colony are dry ab initio.

The colony people currently get their BWSSB Cauvery DW from the adjacent 100ft rd main road underground water pipe.

The present source of (24 hour?) BWSSB cauvery DW. The covered cement tank seen at the front wheel of the parked car is 3 feet deep giving access to the Cauvey DW 6" dia pipe. 

They get enough DW by manipulating. However due to their negligence huge amount of DW some time goes to the Storm Water Drain, as seen today.

I was threatened by the colony people that if there is no DW as a result of my reporting to the authorities they will come to my house and get their supply.

However, I was firm on their being

  1. guilty of wasting precious DW resource.
  2. Not with their getting the DW legally or other wise.

I believe all citizens of this country should have

  1. pure drinking water
  2. Good air to breathe 

free of cost.

Drinking Water to Storm Water Drain  - 1 [This water is headed to a SWD]

Drinking Water to Storm Water Drain  - 2 [This water is headed to a SWD]

 Drinking Water to Storm Water Drain  - 3 [This water is headed to a SWD]

Drinking Water to Storm Water Drain  - 4 [This water is headed to a SWD]

Drinking Water to Storm Water Drain  - 5 [This water is headed to a SWD]

COMMENTS

drainage patterns

tsubba - 28 October, 2009 - 21:55

since the usual suspects are all on this thread i will post it here and not bother to look for relevant thread.

understanding drainage patterns:

http://www.lifewater.ca/Section_2.htm

 

 

A question i would like answered. If BLR's natural drainage system is broken can its functionality be mimicked by a man made drainage system? aren't man made drains like "trellis" aka chappra systems?

why only lakes why not drains too?

a book on fundamentals

tsubba - 28 October, 2009 - 22:03

http://www.physicalgeography.net/fundamentals/contents.html

 

drainage basic concept

http://www.physicalgeography.net/fundamentals/10aa.html

Sewage Water on Road

psaram42 - 25 October, 2009 - 15:36

 Coming to the Sewage Water on the road issue, I give a couple of pictures below.

Picture-1 to 4

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The gaurd holding a kerchief to escape the stench! This gaurd told me that the overflow is there since a week. He does not know the reason or any body has lodged a complaint.

Picture Speaks Better than a Thousand Words

RKCHARI - 25 October, 2009 - 12:12

PSA Garu,

Excellent social work and excellent photographs to highlight the JJ Colony's plight.

Commissioner BBMP is apparently convinced SW Drains should be covered and SW should be allowed to infiltrate. However the trouble lies in the fact that household waste water (kitchen, bath and washing utensils / clothes) mixed in some cases with sewage water gets channelised in to open drains. To stop this malpractice, which in effect, has now become a regular practice by default, it means money, effort and changing people's mindset.

No shortage of money and effort, but changing mindset of people asking them not to allow household waste water to be let out to nearest open drain is next to impossible specially amongst the slum dwellers. They will simply let household waste run on to the roads if open drains get closed!

How to combat this? Besides of course the cartel of contractors who have a strangle hold on the political bosses to ensure their contract to line open drains by concrete / granite slabs is not closed off!

Any Prajagalu has any ideas?

Regards,
Chari

Who is to bell the cat?

psaram42 - 25 October, 2009 - 14:34

 There is no dearth for ideas. Every body is engaged in making hay when sun shines. I am willing to go to the authorities if there is any body behind me or not. However I wish there is at least one soul to give me company.

excellent work..

vinod_shankar - 25 October, 2009 - 14:43

Excellent work PSA .  They way you have narrated the plight of JJ colony people with pictures is fit for front page national dailies, but the fact is the our news paper never carry such issues.  They only bother to carry sensational news items...Just what might BBMP response if times of india carried these on the front page tomorrow? I am sure it would get fixed in a day or two...

vinod

Go to the authorities and tell what?

sanjayv - 25 October, 2009 - 17:36

 That is the question PSA sir.  I can make a few guesses -  but before that, excellent work on the report.

My guesses are as follows.

(1) The tap into the Cauvery pipeline is most probably illegal.

(2) If you go to the authorities, they may at the max, repair the illegal connection and potentially take other penal action.

(3) But these poor guys will not have any dependable water!

So what is the solution?

 

Excellent work sir

silkboard - 25 October, 2009 - 17:58

Sorry for very short comment, but excellent picture blog sir, an example of a post for all of us here. Thank you very much for the insights.

To those who have and how will post god words for PSA sir - please show your appreciation by rating (those stars on top) as well.

Let me clarify Sanjay

psaram42 - 26 October, 2009 - 04:07

 Kindly refer my post where I said:-

 

“I was threatened by the colony people that if there is no DW they will come to my house and get their supply. [Why I am doing all this?] I finally convinced them by being firm on their being guilty of wasting precious DW resource. Not with their getting the DW legally or other wise. I believe it is the birth right of all citizens of this country to have drinking water as is the air they breathe free or otherwise.” 

My points were 

  1. I am against their wasting a precious resource like DW.
  2. I am Not against their getting the water legally or otherwise
  3. In fact I am for their getting drinking water free of cost.  

My other statement regarding going to concerned authorities was for many other issues like 

  1. Sewage water handling,

  2. Storm water Drain Technology up gradation.

  3. Revamp of Road design philosophy

    1. In situ ground water charging.

    2. In citu RWH

    3. Etc

  4. Standardization of Road Design for catering
    1. Power cables

    2. Communication cables

    3. Drinking water pipes

    4. Sanitary water pipes

    5. And whatever goes inside our city roads.

We need to build a rapo with technical people dealing with in BBMP BWSSB ABIDE etc. 

The design standards for roads should be fool proof against any possible bungling. Inspection standards are also important. Suhas is already at the job. Perhaps we should have a presentation. 

Thanks PSA sir

sanjayv - 26 October, 2009 - 04:31

Thanks for the clarification PSA sir.  I agree that engagement on engineering standards etc. is urgently necessary.  I have been missing in action on the BWSSB/lakes issue.  Work has become very busy, and I am helping out a little bit on mobilicity. Will be back once things settle down.

Pranav:  Is there a bug that does not allow rating on the chrome browser?  The drop down menu for rating never shows up and I tend to use chrome nowadays. Works on IE though.

fine for wasting

velaboy - 26 October, 2009 - 09:35

people should be fined for wasting drinking water. just like people are being fined for smoking cigarettes, causing health hazard and polluting the environment air, same way.

PSA Sir - Fine effort

Naveen - 21 January, 2010 - 13:48

Greetings,

I salute a true praja sevak !  This is an examplery piece of research work from PSA. All in pictures that tell the story so exceedingly well.

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