exploring-bengaluru-s-unprecedented-water-crisis-parched-population-cholera-outbreak-fears

The Bengaluru water crisis is a wake-up call for the rest of India. Sadly, for Bengaluru it ignored all the alarms and relied on the snooze button for far too long.

 

Back in November of 2012, the Central Ground Water Authority did notify that Bengaluru was a district where the groundwater was over-exploited. But the warnings remained exactly from where they originated — in theory, on paper.

 

Unchecked construction, uncontrolled migration and unsustainable development continued in Karnataka’s Capital that today has a population of roughly 1.4 crore.

 

Staring in the face of the acute water crisis, for Bengaluru the shortage began in February itself this year, which is much ahead of its usual peak summer months.

 

The city’s water shortage gained intensity enough to leap from local news to the Karnataka Legislative Assembly, and lately even the world media. Its effect on sky-rocketing retail prices is not far behind.

 

Some insensitive memes on social media call on the techies to produce water through software updates. While other memes use satire to highlight that the city has a newer and bigger problem which has long replaced the infamous Bengaluru traffic. 

 

Last month, Karnataka’s Deputy CM DK Shivakumar said the borewell at his house dried up too, suggesting that rich and poor alike, were all facing the problem.

 

The dried borewell is a bad omen, considering the city’s reliance on borewells and water tankers. Earlier this year, Shivakumar himself informed the Assembly during question hour that, “close to 25% of the demand for water in Bengaluru is met by water tankers.” 

 

The disproportionate supply and demand in water tankers led to unregulated profiteering by the tanker cartel.

 

Making the administration cap the prices, last month onwards, to a maximum of Rs 1200 for a load of 12000L. Before this, a 12000 liter tanker was costing anywhere between Rs 1800 to Rs 2500. That’s not it. 

 

Decades of sleepy bureaucracy and administration have been on an overdrive this year. After Holi, within three days, the administration imposed fines of Rs 1.1 lakh for misuse of water.

 

The shortage has hit the levels enough to make housing societies take charge and guard any misuse of water. One such society in Whitefield introduced a fine of Rs 5000 for any use of water for non-essential purposes and even deployed guards to ensure that misuse did not happen.

 

Too little, too late. The capital’s IT boom began in the 1990s, leading to its current population of 1.3 crore where nearly 10 lakh people migrate every year.

 

As for the borewells, its short term fix for water problems, they are fast drying up too. 

 

Rain is not the problem, since Bengaluru gets plenty of it. It’s the unchecked, unsustainable development that has reduced the city to this.

 

The urban borewells have long been its stop gap arrangement, rendering the city’s aquifers dry. The drills are easily hired and drilling failures are all too common, symbolized in the form of cutout circles on streets.

 

Wherever the drills are successful, they have to go much deeper into the ground now. 

 

The water shortage, in statistics 

 

The city depends heavily and primarily on water from the River Cauvery, which gets transported roughly over 100 kilometers.

 

Bengaluru has access to roughly 1,850 million liters per day and it needs an extra 1,680 MLD more to meet water needs. Over 10.37 lakh households are connected to the Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board  (BWSSB) and an additional 10,995 borewells supply 400 MLD of water.

 

Of these over a 1000 to 1200 are at the risk of drying up soon. 

 

The problem never comes alone 

 

Along with the water crisis, the city is now grappling with the tangential problems of poor sanitation and water borne diseases and contaminations.

 

By April 3, one confirmed case of cholera had been reported in the Malleshwaram area and samples from other two cases in the locality sent for testing.

 

Though the city’s civic body is yet to declare a cholera outbreak, the rising number of cases being reported across the hospitals have put the state health department on high alert. 

 

The solutions 

 

The solutions do not remain elusive, but they definitely remain unimplemented. The State Water Policy of 2022 is relatively new, it is only as much as it can arrest water shortage.

 

Cauvery Phase 5 project promises relief but no time frame has been given for its completion.

 

Then there’s the Mekedatu Reservoir Project, supposed to be built near Kanakpura’s Ramanagara district, about 100 kms from Bengaluru.

 

The Dy CM too said, “The solution for this problem is the proposed Mekedatu Reservoir Project.” Since a week ago there’s been a growing chorus urging companies to resort to WFH, so that the migrant workforce could resume work from their hometowns and help tide over the crisis.

 

Now it doesn’t need techies as much as it needs water activists. The Capital has been shaken up from the slumber, but now it will be a tad difficult to catch the next bus.