To flush choked drains Nagpur Municipal Corporation to use 'well water'

To flush city's choked drain and sewerage lines, Nagpur Municipal Corporation(NMC), apart from using potable water to do douse fire, uses drinking water in suction jetting machines.

The NMC's sanitation department on an average attends at least 8-10 complaints of choked drains and sewer line with 10 suction jetting machines (one each with 10 zones) having a capacity of 3,000 litres each. According to calculation it uses about 74.88 lakh litres water per annum.

Now it has been decided by NMC to use 'contaminated' well water to clean choked drains and sewerage lines, as told by health officer (sanitation) Dr. Pradip Dasarwar. This decision was taken by additional municipal commissioner Ravindra Kumbhare, which will be implemented at the earliest said Dr. Pradip Dasarwar.

At present, the NMC fills water from either elevated storage reservoir of from hydrants of the fire department.

According to Dr. Dasarwar, the fire department uses at least 10 dewatering of wells in the city every day to drain the water in drains, which will be used by the health department using pumps for flushing of blockages in sewerage lines.

The capacity of ESR to store water is 22 lakh litres which can caters 15,000 consumers, that means 2.4 lakh people can get water supply in a single day. This is how potable water will be saved to great extent.

A spokesperson from Orange City Water, the private firm entrusted with supplying water in city limits, said, “Such tankers were filling potable water from NMC-OCW hydrant. After this came to light, we now don’t allow such tankers to fill water from our hydrant in any case. We have strictly instructed tanker supervisor and security personnel to stop such tankers to take potable water.”