178 Illegal Water Connections Cut Off by Pune Municipal Corporation

Parts of the city are bearing the load of water scarcity. 

30 April 2024

By Khushi Maheshwari 

Areas and villages located at the extremities of the city had already complained to the PMC multiple times about insufficient water supply. 

To combat the water shortage in these areas, the civic body orchestrated an inspection and found 178 illegal water connections which it had to sever. Out of these, 26 connections were being used for construction in this past month alone. 

By doing this, the municipal organisation intends to maintain water pressure in the most remote parts of the city, which are now experiencing a severe water scarcity.

Out of the complaints received, 30 were from the Hadapsar locality of Pune. 

The superintendent engineer of the PMC water supply department, Prasanna Joshi, informed that 178 unauthorised water connections were severed throughout the month of April. Illegal connections were discovered to be disrupting water supply and posing obstacles in the water supply to the tail locations of the city during PMC’s engineers’ visit. 

Joshi also informed that certain areas that are part of the SNDT water treatment plant were using unauthorised tap water for construction and that these connections were also severed. The PMC supplies tap water for the labour camp, and on the visit it was discovered that there was a tap water pipe inside the water tank; the PMC official assured that unauthorised water access will be cut off by the PMC on a regular basis. 

All four of the Khadakwasla chain’s dams currently contain about nine thousand million cubic feet (TMC) of water, which is more than two TMC less than what it was the same time last year. Given the circumstances, the district collector for Pune has already issued stringent guidelines for water consumption to be prudent.

Keshav Nagar was the source of most of the complaints over the poor quality of the water supply. The civic authorities discovered that the tail sections of cow shed owners and inhabitants in Kumbharwada were hurting because they had obtained illegal water connections. After that, 45 of these unauthorised connections were severed by the PMC.

There is currently a serious water deficit in the 34 villages that were accommodated under the PMC to the point where they have to purchase water from tankers once or twice each week.