Residents of south Bangalore should brace themselves for a massive disruption on their pavements and roads as the Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB) is going for a complete overhaul of its pipelines to check water leakage.
Localities like Chamarajpet, MN Krishna Rao Park, Gandhi Bazaar, Yediyur Tank area, Jayanagar, Basavanagudi, VV Puram and Hale Guddadahalli will be badly hit because of the project, under which about 60,000 of the 1.05 lakh water meters in Bangalore South will be replaced.
The BWSSB has also said that in all, 145 km length of pipelines will be replaced for this pilot project.
The board is also contemplating changing the house service connections — the pipelines that supply water from the main pipe on the road to the residential units. “Our estimates say that major loss of water occurs here. The target is to bring down the leakage from the current 36% to 16%,” BWSSB chairman PB Ramamurthy said. Work will begin in three months.
The total project cost is Rs174 crore and would be awarded to the lowest bidders, who are L&T, SE-SPL, JUSCO, Veolia Water, Manila Water and GVPR Engineers.
Under the project, BWSSB will also install 40 bulk-flow meters to monitor consumption of water in South Bangalore. The South Zone will be divided into 40 districts, each of 52 sq km and having 2,500 connections. A bulk flow meter will be installed at the feeder mains in each of these districts.
Once the project proves to be successful, it will be extended to all six zones of the city.
The contractor will be given three years to implement and three years to operate and maintain the work. The chairman assured of no additional charges being passed on to the consumers.
Also, as a separate programme for non-revenue water, four NGOs have been roped in to provide individual sanitary connections to 120 slums in the city so that the water going to these localities can be accounted for too. The NGOs that will work with BWSSB are Mythri Sarva Seva, New entity for Social action, India Community Service Society and Mahatma Gandhi Trust.
