Half-bucket baths, waste water for mopping: Crisis worsens in Bengaluru

Bengaluru, one of India’s bonafide metropolitan cities with a population of above 13 million, is staring down the barrel of an unprecedented water crisis.

A government pushed into emergency measures – taking over all irrigation and commercial borewells, and mandating the registration of every private water tanker in the city. Residents pushed into emergency measures of their own – instructions to stop washing cars and balconies, bathe with half a bucket of water, and or use a “half flush” after daily ablutions.

Bengaluru, Mar 05 (ANI): People wait for their turn to fill their gallons with running water for their basic needs after the Silicon City area faces a severe water crisis, in Bengaluru on Tuesday. (ANI Photo)

Bengaluru, one of India’s bonafide metropolitan cities with a population of above 13 million – where the glass edifices of multinational conglomerates house some of the country’s most prolific IT talent; where streets such as MG Road and Brigade Road twinkle with upscale revelry every evening; where the apartment buildings grow ever taller and the traffic ever more crowded – is staring down the barrel of an unprecedented water crisis, and its administration and people have been left scrambling. It is a problem caused by rapid, untrammelled growth, complete disregard of the city’s natural water bodies, although the trigger is the failure, in Karnataka, of both the southwest and the northeast monsoon.

On Monday, in acknowledgement of the gravity of the problem, deputy chief minister and Bengaluru development minister DK Shivakumar issued directions to the Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB) to take charge of all irrigation and commercial borewells in the city. He said that water did not “belong to individuals”, but at a time of a water crisis, to the government to attempt to ease the situation. “Of the 16,781 borewells in our records, 6,997 borewells have dried up. The remaining 7,784 are operational. The government will be drilling new borewells,” he said.

For several days, tankers laden with water entered gates and exited them, buzzing around the city, answering panicked calls, and charging exorbitant rates, ranging from ₹500 to ₹2,000 for a tanker. On Monday, Shivakumar said that the government was stepping in to control the “tanker mafia”, and asked private contractors to register themselves with the municipal corporation by March 7, so that the government can ration water effectively. On Tuesday, in a series of emergency meetings, there was another decision taken. Tankers owned by the Karnataka Milk Federation will be cleaned, and deployed to supply water for a thirsty city.

On Tuesday, chief minister Siddaramaiah announced a series of decisions – from taluk-level control rooms and helpline numbers to task forces headed by local legislators, laying blame of the crisis on an unprecedented drought. Of the 236 taluks in the state, 223 have been drought-hit, with 219 severely affected, he said. This, officials said, affected water supply both from the Cauvery, and borewells, two of Bengaluru’s principal sources of water. One official said: “The crisis may worsen if there is no good rain in the coming days as already close to half the borewells have dried up.”

But with lives increasingly affected, housing societies have begun to ration water on their own, issuing increasingly panicked instructions to their residents. Palm Meadows housing society in Whitefield has asked residents not to water their lawns or their vehicles. In Indira Nagar, the Benaka Towers residents association issued an eight-point guideline on Monday, which included “half bucket baths”, “half flush after nature’s call”, “economy cycle of washing machines”, and using waste water from aquaguard filters to mop the floor and bathrooms.

Dipali Sikand, a hospitality sector executive who lives in Koramangala, has seen herself pay increasingly high rates for private water tankers, now up to ₹1,000 for a 4,000 litre tanker. “Since the BWSSB water supply is erratic now, I buy water every other day. I have to make a separate budget for water. And even then, the quality that is supplied is terrible, and some days, I found worms inside,” she said.

A resident of Mantri Alpyne in Subramanyapura, who is due to deliver a child in the next few days, said that she had to shift, after the apartment asked its residents to finish all daily chores that require water before 8am. “After that, there is no supply till 8pm, and I have moved to my mother’s home where the situation is a little better,” she said. Nagesh Aras, a water conservation expert, said that in 2018, BWSSB had launched a scheme to install aggregate meters to measure the requirement and usage of water in the city, in collaboration with the Japan International Cooperation Agency. “One such aggregate meter was installed outside my apartment. One day, the meter which was installed on a pedestal fell, vehicles ran over it, and that was the end of the issue,” he said.

The crisis has also set off a political battle, with Siddaramaiah lashing out at the Centre on Tuesday, accusing them of not releasing ₹18,172 crore that Karnataka had asked for to mitigate effects of the drought. “We gave the first memorandum to the Centre in October but so far, got nothing.” The BJP, however, said that the state had failed to deal with the situation at hand, and had hurt “brand Bengaluru” in the process. “What does Shivakumar mean by ‘brand Bengaluru’ when the city is reeling under a water crisis?,” spokesperson S Prakash said.