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Beed diary: No civic water supply in Parli town for last 100 days
While Sangli, Karad, Kolhapur and Pune in western Maharashtra are in the grip of devastating floods, the parched parts of Marathwada in the other region of the same state, have entered into the 39th week of the drought
In the midst of high rainfall deficiency which has affected most of Marathwada, Parli town in Beed district is among the worst hit. The people here have not received civic water supply for the last 100 days at a stretch as the town’s main source of water, Wan Dam in Nagapur, has dried up completely.
While Sangli, Karad, Kolhapur and Pune in western Maharashtra are in the grip of devastating floods, the parched parts of Marathwada in the other region of the same state, have entered into the 39th week of the drought.
Beed received just 157.8 mm rainfall as of August 9, the lowest in Marathwada. The rainfall deficiency in Beed rose to 39% as of August 7 even as the India Meteorological Department (IMD), pegged Beed’s average annual rainfall at 666 mm.
A bastion of the late BJP leader Gopinath Munde’s clan, the Parli assembly constituency is now represented by his daughter, Pankaja Munde. She is Maharashtra’s minister for Rural Development, Women and Child Welfare and guardian minister for Beed district.
This town of 1.26 lakh people requires about 6.5 MLD (million litres per day) of water and the Parli Vaijinath Municipal Council draws water from Wan Dam in Nagapur village.
While the municipal council says that it supplies 50 litres per day per person on an average in a normal year; in the midst of the drought it has been able to supply water to just 24 water tankers. The district collectorate has supplemented this with an additional 17 tankers for the entire population.
Dilip Rode, head of Parli’s civic water supply department said,“This year there is no storage in the dam due to failure of the monsoon season. There is no water in the Wan dam or the Bandumi dam and hence we are supplying water through 41 water tankers. We hope the region will get good rainfall and the situation will normalise.”
Residents said water-related conflicts were on the rise due to the acute scarcity. People tend to break into fights the moment a water tanker arrives in a area,” said Devidas Shelke, Police Inspector Parli City Police Station. He said in the last two months, 12 such reports had been registered in the city police station.
Three months ago, frustrated residents of Parli had protested with a hunger strike in front of the municipal council.
Vyankatesh Shinde 32, a resident said, his locality had not received municipal water supply for the past 110 days.
“All the taps in the city have been running dry for the last three-and-half months. The civic tankers are not enough to meet our needs,” he said, adding that he spends almost Rs 3,000 per month to purchase water from private water tanker suppliers.
Yamunabai Sontakke (44), a resident of Krishna Nagar, spends the entire day searching for water. “We have to travel kilometre by kilometre to fetch water from private bore or wells.” Television news showing flooding situation in Kolhapur and Sangli but unfortunately we have to struggle daily for drinking water needs,Yamunabai told.
Areas in the Parli like Malikpura,Ganeshpar,Swabhiman Nagar and Krishna Nagar have been hit badly and residents have been forced purchase water from private tankers. A small tanker of 3.500-4000 litres sells water for about Rs. 500 while a large one with 10,000 litres capacity costs up to Rs 1000.
The Ground Water Survey and Development Agency (GSDA) has reported that by March-end, Parli had groundwater depletion of more than 3 metres.
Parli is a political battleground for minister Pankaja Munde and her cousin Dhananjay Munde who is leader of opposition in the Maharashtra Legislative Council. The Parli Vaijinath municipal council is run by the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and the residents have complained that the civic water tankers give priority to NCP corporators. Civic officials refuted these allegations.
