The Hindu : Kerala / Thiruvananthapuram News : Tanker-lorry operators using fake requests

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Mar 11, 2005

Kerala

Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram

Tanker-lorry operators using fake requests

By G. Mahadevan

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM, MARCH. 10. At a time when many parts of the city are going without water, tanker-lorry operators are alleged to be using fake requests for buying tens of thousands of litres of drinking water at a low rate from the bulk filling station of the Kerala Water Authority (KWA) at Vellayambalam. The water is then sold at a higher price to commercial establishments in the city.

To check the racket, the authority is planning to introduce a uniform rate of Rs. 24 a kilolitre for bulk quantities of water. The KWA is also likely to introduce computerised billing to replace the current system of prepaid coupons. A report submitted by a team of KWA engineers who tried to trace the customers on whose behalf water was purportedly bought by the operators says that 95 per cent of the daily purchases were through bogus requests and were not for the individuals or institutions in whose name the request for water was submitted.

For the last two years, the KWA has not been selling water directly to tanker-lorry operators. They are required to produce requests from customers to get water from the bulk filling station.

For the first 50,000 litres of water thus purchased by a customer in a month, the price is Rs. 16 a kilolitre and for every 1,000 litres above that, the price is Rs. 24. Almost all these faked requests were for 55,000 litres of water so that tanker operators would have to pay only Rs. 16 a kilolitre. This water is then sold to various commercial establishments in the city for a profit.

Fake letters

Copies of the requests submitted by tanker-lorry operators accessed by The Hindu revealed that the contact numbers of the customer given in the letter-pad on which the request has been made are bogus. For instance, KWA records show that the `Mar Discorious College of Pharmacy, Kattale' had requested for and was given 55,000 litres of water in February. (The name of the college was wrongly spelt in the application.)

The phone number given on the letter-pad turned out to be the contact number of an ambulance service. The name of the college as given in the letter-pad too was wrong. The principal of the Mar Discorus College of Pharmacy, Kattela, Antony Kurien, told The Hindu that his institution had never made such a request to the KWA.

Similarly, the request reportedly made by Santhigiri Ashramam, Pothencode, also turned out to be bogus. The number given in the "ashram's letter-head" was that of a house at Kattayikkonam.

The KWA records also show a sale of 55,000 litres of water to Loyola School, Sreekaryam, in February. The school Principal, Varghese Anikuzhy, said the institution had not made such a request for water for many years now. "The last time we required the services of a tanker lorry was in 1996," Fr. Anikuzhy said.

Though KWA officials say they have no means of verifying the authenticity of requests, some obviously bogus requests too have been sanctioned by the authority. One such request was from Zakir Hussain of Vellayambalam. The `request' from Mr. Hussain, given on February 23, was for 55,000 litres. However, Simi Zakir, his wife, said her request was only for 5,000 litres. "We got only one tanker-load of water. That is all I had asked for," she explained.

At least 11 such bogus requests were made in the month of February; seven were submitted on February 28. On July 7, 2004, the Executive Engineer of the PH division, KWA, had ordered that coupons for sale of water be given directly from the division office at Vellayambalam. However, coupons are still being issued by a clerk at the water supply (projects) sub-division on the Observatory Hills.

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