Discoloured, but water potable, BMC insists

The municipal corporation reiterated that the yellow-tinted water that has been flowing out of your taps since last week is safe to drink.

The municipal corporation reiterated that the yellow-tinted water that has been flowing out of your taps since last week is safe to drink.

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“We have collected 127 water samples from various parts of the city, western suburb reservoirs and consumers in the last eight days and tested them in the civic lab. Not a single sample was found unfit to drink,” said Aseem Gupta, additional municipal commissioner. “Though potable, people should boil water before drinking.”

Moreover, as a precaution, the civic administration will ensure that a new stock of alum will be used to treat the water at the Bhandup water treatment plant.

Civic officials had earlier said that the iron and manganese oxidation process could have caused the water, which had been recently released from Upper Vaitarna after a three-month break, to discolour.

The issue had also been raised in the civic standing committee meeting on Wednesday. Despite the administration’s assurances that the water was fit to drink, corporators were not satisfied.

Bharatiya Janata Party corporator Bhalchandra Shirsat had said that the administration should also clarify that the discoloured water would not prove hazardous in the long run.

On Tuesday, the corporation had decided to undertake a third-party test to check the quality of water.

On Wednesday, the BMC had also stopped withdrawing water from Upper Vaitarna.