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Water woes trouble Panchkula residents, officials deny shortage
Despite Panchkula residents’ complaints, officials maintain city’s daily demand of 110 MGD is being met by Kajauli Waterworks, Kaushalya Dam & underground sources
With the rise in temperature, Panchkula residents’ water woes have also multiplied. Complaints have been pouring in regarding inadequate supply and low pressure, but Haryana Shahari Vikas Pradhikaran (HSVP) officials remain in denial mode, claiming there is no water shortage in the city.
For the last three weeks, members of the Citizens’ Welfare Association (CWA) have been raising the issue of water scarcity and have written to senior-most HSVP officials for a solution.
Yet, HSVP executive engineer (XEN) Payal maintains that the city’s daily demand of 110 million gallons (MGD) is being adequately met through Kajauli Waterworks, Kaushalya Dam and tubewells.
“While 40 MGD each is supplied from Kajauli Waterworks and Kaushalya Dam, the remaining requirement of 30 MGD is met through underground reserves. Looking at the increasing demand, four to five tubewells are added annually,” the XEN said.
On the other hand, president of the Citizens’ Welfare Association and resident of Sector 15, SK Nayar said, “Earlier, we used to start getting fresh water by 5 am, but now, the supply starts 20 minutes late and that too at very poor pressure. We get full pressure only between 6 am and 8.25 am, while earlier it would continue till 9 am. Amid low pressure, water doesn’t reach the first and second floors.”
“Similar is the scenario in the evening, as we start receiving water half an hour late and the supply stops 30 minutes early. Earlier, the fixed timings were 5 pm to 9 pm. We have conveyed this several times to HSVP officials. But they keep making false claims of no water shortage,” added Nayar.
KK Jindal, president of Residents Welfare Association, Sector 20, said due to low water pressure, they were being forced to call water tankers.
RP Malhotra, president of Federation of Residents’ Associations (FORA) and a resident of Sector 8, said, “The water crisis has continued for over five weeks. Sometimes, even the ground floor houses get low water pressure.”
But XEN Payal claimed, “There is no question of low pressure. Panchkula has 14 underground water storage tanks with capacities varying from 2 lakh gallons to 10 lakh gallons. At times, even booster bumps are used to supply water both from these tanks and underground pumps. Then there are 14 waterworks to maintain pressure in supply across sectors.”
He added that in fact due to availability of adequate supply, they were planning to increase the evening supply timings to 4 pm to 9 pm in June and further to 3 pm to 9 pm by July.
The XEN further said they also ensure there was no water leakage in Panchkula to avoid wastage: “Whenever we get a complaint regarding a leakage, the staff promptly repairs it.”
Further to prevent water scarcity in summer, HSVP has already imposed a ban on watering of lawns, and washing of cars and courtyards using a hosepipe in the morning. Violators will face a fine of ₹5,000, but no one has been challaned since the ban came into effect last week.
Another HSVP official, not wishing to be named, said occasionally, electricity cuts can hamper the water supply, but there was no shortage of water.
Power cuts make matters worse
Notably, power cuts have been commonplace in recent days across the city, with the administration also issuing red alerts for the same. Officials have put out requests seeking residents’ co-operation in this regard.
“In view of the power shortage, cuts are to be imposed on all urban feeders for 40 minutes. please cooperate,” a message shared by the sub divisional officer SDO read.
“There is a nationwide power shortage, which has impacted 12 states including Haryana. Increased demand in summers can lead to power cuts. The same is managed from a centralised control room, managed at state level,” SDO Sanjay Verma, Uttar Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam said.
Residents said that power cuts have adversely impacted water supply. Subhash Papneja, a Sector 16 resident pointed out, “Forty-minute-long power cuts twice or thrice a day have made things much worse.”
