Every Drop Counts: Water woes haunt Mumbai's western suburbs

Water woes continue to haunt residents of western suburbs, especially in areas like Vile Parle, Jogeshwari and Andheri (east). People living in these areas alleged that water cut in their respective area is amounts to 50 per cent.

They said there is no improvement despite complaints being submitted to local ward officials, as well as the hydraulic engineering department of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC).

Residents said that water supply has also come down in the past one month. "The pressure of water supply has drastically come down in the last one month and we have to store water in buckets as the pressure is not enough to push water up to the tanks," said Sushma Digambar, a resident of road number one of the Tejpal scheme, in Vile Parle (east). She added that earlier they used to get water from 5pm to 8pm but, over the last month, water is supplied from 5.45pm to some time before 8pm.

Another local of the area said that they are facing a 50% water cut and this can be proved using the water metre. "I have recorded the supply on the water metre and realised that we are getting around 5,000 to 6000 litre of water per day. Earlier, we were getting over 10,000 litre," Sushma Dongre from Vile Parle said.

Shailesh Gaitonde, another resident of Vile Parle said that most of their time is spent in storing water. "The tank gets emptied in only half an hour as everyone stores water. We do not have an option as we know that there will be no supply in the next 24 hours," Gaitonde said. He further added that water supply has been so insuffiecient in the last 30 days that they cannot have a bath daily.

Local corporators agreed to the water supply issue. Abhijeet Sawant, Bhartiya Janata Party corporator from Vile Parel and a standing committee member, said, there are problems in the supply of water due to the ongoing pipeline laying work. However, in the last one month, the problem has aggravated. "I have written to the civic chief and have demanded immediate relief. If there is no solution, I will agitate in the standing committee meeting," Sawant said.