Acute water shortage, halt new projects: Kharghar hsg societies to CIDCO

On March 28, the Kharghar Cooperative Housing Societies Federation, which has 505 housing societies as members, wrote to CIDCO

Panvel: Housing societies in the rapidly growing suburb of Kharghar have urged the City and Industrial Development Corporation (CIDCO) to stop issuing commencement and occupation certificates to new projects as the area is already reeling under acute water shortage.

Residents said they were managing somehow using water supplied by tankers. (Bachchan Kumar/ HT PHOTO)

On March 28, the Kharghar Cooperative Housing Societies Federation, which has 505 housing societies as members, wrote to CIDCO, saying all societies were facing water shortage and providing details of 125 housing societies that were facing a 30-50% water cut. Residents were managing somehow using water supplied by tankers and feared the situation would become far worse if new projects were sanctioned without any alternative source of water, the federation stated in the letter.

“Our society has been facing a 30% water cut for a long time. It gets worse during festivals and we have no option but to depend on water tankers,” said Amit Kumar, secretary, Arihant Krupa housing society located in sector 27, Kharghar.

Kumar said that while 200 new 40-50 storeyed buildings were already under construction in Kharghar, CIDCO was selling land to developers non-stop.

SH Kalawat, general secretary of the housing societies’ federation, said as per their discussions with water supply department officials, the requirement of water in Kharghar and Taloja was 100 million litres per day (mld), while the supply from various sources was 82 mld, leading to a shortfall of 18 mld.

“The situation is going to get far worse in the near future as CIDCO has constructed 25,000 homes here under its affordable housing scheme. Once the Navi Mumbai airport commences operations, demand for water will spike by another 5 mld,” he cautioned. He also rued the lack of any new dam projects to augment water supply in the suburb.

“We will meet the CIDCO MD (managing director) soon with our demand to halt the issuance of commencement and occupation certificates,” said Kalawat. “We will approach the state and central government if necessary. Residents and housing societies are willing to join the fight in large numbers.”

CIDCO did not respond to questions from HT.