The Hindu : Kerala / Thiruvananthapuram News : Ordinance to check water theft soon

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Oct 24, 2007
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Kerala

Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram

Ordinance to check water theft soon

Staff Reporter

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The government will, in the next few days, bring out an ordinance amending the Kerala Water Supply and Sewerage Act with a view to fighting rampant theft of piped drinking water supplied by the Kerala Water Authority.

‘Water cards’ would be issued to all genuine consumers of the KWA and subsequently the water connections of persons who do not have the card would be severed.

This was stated by Minister for Water Resources N. K. Premachandran in his inaugural address at a workshop on Water Quality Control and Management organised here by the KWA.

No consumer data

At present there was no comprehensive data on the consumers of the authority. This was particularly so in the rural areas.

A random check conducted across the State revealed the existence of thousands of water connections.

The quantity of water lost to such illegal connections was estimated to be 30 to 35 per cent of the total water produced by the authority, he said.

Unauthorised connections were causing huge revenue losses to the KWA. The authority owed the Kerala State Electricity Board Rs.580 crores by way of unpaid power bills. Already, the power supply to KWA facilities, including drinking water schemes, had been cut or were under threat of disconnection. This problem was now being studied by a Cabinet sub-committee.

There were demands to strengthen the 14 quality control laboratories of the KWA and the referral lab that operated at Aluva. There was also the question of finding adequate funds for this.

Quality check

A comprehensive scheme for checking the quality of water at source could be put in place if the operations of the Central government funded ‘Sujala’ scheme and those of the KWA were integrated. Water contamination was found to be higher in schemes where water was pumped to consumers after mere chlorination. In places where there were filtering plants, pollution was near-zero.

However, even in such a situation old and leaking pipes could lead to contamination of water at the users’ end. The aim of the KWA was to supply drinking water with “zero contamination,’ Mr. Premachandran said.

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