BMC unveils plan to clean up your water

Three days after HT reported that water supplied to the western suburbs of Mumbai in July had ‘infinite’ contamination, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has announced a series of steps to fix the problem.

Three days after HT reported that water supplied to the western suburbs of Mumbai in July had ‘infinite’ contamination, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has announced a series of steps to fix the problem.

HT Image

Among the short-term measures announced is an immediate audit by NEERI (National Environmental Engineering Research Institute) of the three reservoirs in which the contaminated water was detected. Besides, chlorine-testing kits will be introduced at the reservoir outlets, which will instantly reveal the amount of chlorine present in the water, and samples will be collected from the outlets every day, as opposed to every alternate day. Also, the chlorine dosage administered on the days when the contaminated samples were detected will be verified.

Among long-term measures, the BMC plans a complete review of the method by which the samples are collected and tested, and an overhaul of the chlorination process used, if necessary.

HT had, in its September 10 edition, reported that 24 samples collected from three major reservoirs in July contained E.coli, bacteria found in human and animal faeces. Of these, the presence of E.coli in nine samples was ‘infinite’, prompting civic officials to privately admit that water with such a large presence of the bacteria is as good as sewage water.