Muddy drinking water hits 22 colonies in Ghatkesar, Residents seek HMWSSB action
HYDERABAD: For more than a month and a half, people living in 22 colonies in the Ghatkesar circle have been getting muddy, untreated drinking water. Social activist Suresh Kumar Akkala said that the Hyderabad Metropolitan Water Supply and Sewerage Board (HMWSSB) has not properly treated the water taken from the Krishna River source during the current monsoon season.
Suresh said the problem started about six weeks ago, when the heavy rains began. Since then, he explained, the water sent to these colonies comes from the Krishna River and should be filtered and treated at a water treatment plant before reaching homes. However, he said this process has not worked at all.
Speaking to HyderabadMail, Suresh said, “If the water is muddy, it clearly hasn’t been treated.” He explained that river water usually carries silt during the rainy season, which is normal. However, he said, the real problem is that there are no effective treatment facilities or processes to remove the silt before the water comes out of people’s taps.
“A household water purifier removes silt from muddy water, and the same idea should work here,” Suresh said. In fact, he argued, seeing dirty water come from taps is clear proof that HMWSSB’s water treatment process is not working the way it should. He called this a failure by the water board to keep water quality standards.
Suresh was especially worried about families that do not have their own water filters at home. He said many people have no choice except to drink the untreated water. “Most people would be affected if they drank this water,” he said. He warned that drinking untreated water for a long time could cause health problems.
Suresh said the problem affects all 22 colonies in the Ghatkesar circle. Furthermore, he explained that water is sent through about 10 to 15 overhead storage tanks, and each tank supplies water to five or six colonies. All the water comes from a single main pipeline, which was built as part of the Mission Bhagiratha project. Because of this, if the water is not treated at the source, the whole network is affected.
Residents are asking HMWSSB to quickly fix the water treatment problem in the affected areas. In addition, they want the board to explain clearly what is being done to solve the water contamination issues.
