Cuttack: Large-scale wastage of drinking water in the Silver city here may push the residents into a severe water crisis in the coming days.
Around 30 to 40 per cent of the drinking water supplied by the Public Health Engineering Organisation (PHEO) is being wasted away on a daily basis here, sources said.
With 6 lakh inhabitants, the Silver City requires 92.85 million litres of drinking water every day. However, the PHEO is supplying 107.7 million litres of potable water to the residents every day. The drinking water is being sourced from 195 bore wells, sources added.
It is learnt that altogether 78,000 households in Cuttack have drinking water connections from the PHEO while the city has 3,000 stand posts cater to the need of lower middleclass and poor people.
“We are supplying adequate drinking water to the residents of Cuttack. But, several lakh litres of water are being wasted away due to several reasons,” said PHEO executive engineer Sushant Ghadei.
Leaking pipelines, overflow from rooftop tankers, damaged stand posts and above all carelessness of the people are blamed for large-scale wastage of drinking water, said a source.
It is learnt that water cess to the tune of Rs 16.85 crore is pending with various business entities, apartment complexes, industries and common people in the city here.
“A total of Rs 23.90 crore was pending as water cess. We have managed to collect Rs 7.05 crore in the current fiscal. We are creating awareness among people to clear their dues. Warnings have been issued to snap water supply to the defaulters,” Ghadei said.
PHEO sources, meanwhile, claimed that several projects are being implemented in the city to source drinking water from rivers. “There is excess iron content in water collected from bore wells. The state government is implementing several projects to purify river water and supply it to the people,” Ghadei said.