Vikramaditya & John Wilbert
Port Blair, May 09: In many areas of Port Blair Municipal Council people are deeply shocked to notice that the PBMC is supplying water once in three days that too without any notice issued to the public or any information of water curtailment issued by the APWD to PBMC.
Earlier water was supplied to the public every alternate day by PBMC and people of the Municipal area were more or less comfortable with the alternate day water supply but they claim that water supply once in three day is too much for them.
Most importantly, recently the Administration has completed the Rutland Water Supply Project and had earlier claimed that from now there will be no shortage of water in South Andaman region but to the utter dismay of people of Port Blair city despite heavy rain in last few days the PBMC is supply water only once in three days to public in some areas that too without proper information.
Andaman Sheekha Daily contacted a senior officer of APWD in this regard, who on the condition of anonymity said that the APWD did not notify for further curtailment in water supply.
However, he accepted that there is some issue in supplying water to the water treatment plant and there is a delay in supply of water but there is no curtailment from the side of APWD.
He confirmed that like previous days APWD is supplying 32 MLD of water to PBMC everyday but probably due to delay in supplying water since the last few days there might be curtailment in water supply in some areas.
At present the water level of Dhanikhari Dam has gone down to 54.52 meters, which is only 6. 42 meters higher than the dead level.
The APWD officer said that due to decrease in water level the pressure of water has also reduced.
“We are working on an alternative plan to install pumping units and within three days pumping units will be placed after which there will be no delay in supplying water to PBMC,” he assured.
Regarding water from Rutland Water Supply Project, he said that APWD is getting 06 MLD of water everyday from Rutland Water Supply Project and only because of this additional amount of water the South Andaman region did not witness massive water curtailment from January 2022.
