Mumbai: In face of water cuts, expert tells households how to minimise usage

The water stock of the city has reduced to a meager 76 per cent. To tackle the crisis, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation has imposed a 10 per cent water cut across the city and a 15 per cent cut in the water supply timings.

This also means that the people of Mumbai need to use water far more judiciously in order to ensure minimum wastage. 

Hence, to raise awareness on the situation at hand, DNA correspondents, under the ‘Count the drops’ initiative, visited three families in Dadar’s Shivaji Park area with water expert and former Hydraulic Engineer of Mumbai city Madhukar Kambale. 

The water expert gave the families tips on how to conserve water and reduce usage by as much as 20 per cent. 

Eight families residing in 2BHK flats in Nirmal Building near Shivaji Park, were visited. 

The correspondent knocked the doors of the Kamats, the Chhedhas and the Kalokhes. 

Though it was found out that most of them already use water judiciously, the water expert gave them advice on how to cut down usage further. 

All the families decided to consider the expert’s advice diligently. 

The correspondent will be visiting these households again next week to find out how many of the suggestions action were implemented properly and the difficulties the families encountered while observing them.

RAMCHANDRA AND MANALI KAMAT

Water Expert Madhukar Kambale demonstrates to Manali Kamat how to wipe off excess oil from utensils to save water

Ramachandra and Manali Kamat stay on the 3rd floor of Nirmal Building. They have a full-time maid who takes care of chores such as washing clothes, utensils, mopping the floor, etc. All three members use a full flush tank which stores 10 litre of water. Water expert Madhukar Kambale told them they need only three litre water. 

He suggested them to cut water supply from he flush by pushing the nob upwards in the middle. They use 10 litre water for bathing, which is not a lot and doesn’t require cutting down. 

Though they need three and a half buckets of water to wash clothes daily, Kambale told them about the secret of using washing powder judiciously. “Don’t go by the advertisements. We generally use double the powder than needed and subsequently waste more water in rinsing out the lather.”

The Kamat family sprinkles water on the plants through a spray bottle, which helps cut down water usage. Sometimes, they even use kitchen waste water, which is the best way of saving water as well as supplying nutrients to the plants. 

Manali agreed to cut use of water from the flush tank and promised to look into how much water is used by the security guard to clean the two vehicles they own. They even said they will wipe off excess oil from utensils with tissue papers to save water.

PRASHANT KALOKHE & GOURI KALOKHE

Kambale giving instruction to Gouri Kalokhe on how to reduce usage of water in a washing machine

There are five members in the Kalokhe family. Gouri and Prashant Kalokhe live with their two sons and a nephew and all the members are well aware of water scarcity. Though they have a washing machine, Gouri uses only one cycle to wash bedsheets and blankets and then wash them in a bucket to restrict water use. 

They have a maid to wash daily use clothes and Gouri said that it took them one year to educate the maid about using water judiciously. The family even placed a two and a half litre bottle in the flush tank to cut down on water use for toilet. 

Water usage is related to our food habits also. It takes less water to wash a cup or pot if we drink black tea or lemon tea. But if one consumes milk tea, the water usage increases manifold. The same goes for oily utensils. Using tissue paper to wipe out the oil cuts down water wastage to a great extent.

Gouri and Prathmesh agreed upon the efficacy of these factors and agreed to work on it. 

All the family members prefer using a bucket to take a bath and Gouri agreed to ask her nephew to a use a bucket too instead of bathing under a shower. 

They have one vehicle and it takes about one bucket of water to wash it and they use tap water for plants. They have promised to cut down usage on these as well.

ABHAY CHHEDA AND HIS FAMILY OF THREE

Kambale interacts with Abhay Chheda as he explains how they use less detergent to cut water wastage

There are four members in the Chheda family. The couple has a son and Abhay’s mother is currently staying with them. They have a full-day maid to take care of household chores. The family also has a pet dog. 

Mrs Chheda wasn’t home when the expert visited and no one else knew about water used by their front-load automatic washing machine. However, Abhay had an interesting information to recount about their usage of washing powder. 

They use a full spoon (which comes with the packet of washing powder) of powder, but a serviceman told them to use only 20 to 25 per cent of it, since most of the powder accumulates on the surface of the machine. So now they use less and believe it definitely helps in saving water. 

They believe 10-litre water in the flush tank is a necessity and don’t want to cut down usage there. However, to minimise wastage, they push the nob upwards after pressing it gently. In this way they use only half of the flush water. “I realised that modern toilets need more water, but we can’t do much about it,” said Abhay. 

The maid uses running tap water to wash utensils and water expert Madhukar Kambale believes this can be changed to bring down water wastage. “Bucket water is enough to wash utensils. One can also keep a tab on the flow of tap water,” Kambale said.