Shortage of water on fourth consecutive day annoys citizens

CSMC implements shut down in water supply again.

Lokmat News Network

Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar:

An air of disappointment prevails amongst the citizens after the pipeline of 1400 mm diameter got damaged again at Chitegaon at 12 noon on Saturday.

Earlier, the same pipeline was damaged at Chitegaon on Friday morning. The water supply officials of Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar Municipal Corporation (CSMC) and Maharashtra Jeevan Pradhikaran (MJP) completed the repairing task late in the night and then

resumed the lifting and supplying of water to the city from Saturday morning. However, the CSMC officials had to implement the shut down in water supply to undertake the repair works immediately.

It may be noted that the testing of the 900 mm pipeline was undertaken on Wednesday. Hence the water supply was diverted from the old 1400 mm pipeline to 900 mm pipeline through cross-connection. This experimentation proved dearer to all. The old pipeline was not able to bear the fluctuation in water supply pressure. Hence from Thursday to Saturday the pipeline was damaged three times.

The citizens claimed that the experiments of the experts have proved futile and they are pushed to suffer to survive without water. Many areas of the city have been deprived of water in their taps for the last 12 days.

What happened on Saturday?

The welding of the joint of the two pipelines got damaged at Nakshatrawadi on Saturday morning. In the meantime, the welding of the 1400 mm pipeline also got damaged near Pharola Phata. Hence the civic officials stopped the water supply and implemented a shut down at 12 noon. The repairing works were undertaken on war-footing, said the CSMC executive engineer (water supply) K M Phalak adding that the supply of water will be made at any cost to the city during late night hours.

What was the experiment

On the request of MJP, the CSMC implemented the shut down in water supply for 10 hours on Wednesday morning. However, the shut down hours increased as it took 24 hours to cross-connect the 900 mm pipeline with the 1400 mm pipeline. When the water supply was resumed on Thursday morning, the valve on the 900-mm pipeline got disjointed at Pharola. This task was completed and the water supply was resumed from Friday. However, the 1400-mm main pipeline got damaged. This was repaired and the water supply was resumed on Saturday and another damage took place in the same pipeline in the afternoon.

Box

There was no need to cross-connect both the pipelines under the guise of testing the new pipeline.

The testing could have been done by fixing a separate lifting pump set. Due to its absence the old 1400 pipeline could not bear the water pressure.