Illegal borewell owners are put up with the penalty of up to Rs. 10,000 and/or imprisonment up to three years.(GET SAFE BOREWELL DRILLING BY BOREWELLMART)
In a bid to check unauthorised drilling of borewells in
Bengaluru city, the Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB) is
planning to launch an initiative to identify unregistered borewells by visiting
individual houses.
Bengaluru city is suffering from acute water shortage and fast depleting
groundwater levels. Three months ago, the Karnataka government made it
mandatory to have authorisation to dig wells or borewells in Bengaluru and 11
other districts of the state. The directive applies to Bengaluru east, north
and southern areas and 32 taluks spread over the 11 districts. The government
had also decided to penalise owners of illegal wells and borewells in these
areas by disconnecting their electricity supply.
The new rule makes it mandatory for all existing borewell owners as well
as those drilling new borewells or open wells, both for domestic and commercial
purposes, to pay a fee and register in a prescribed format. Failure to comply
can attract a penalty of up to Rs. 10,000 and/or imprisonment up to three
years.
Unaware of the decision, residents continue to drill borewells.
An official says, “When the rule was notified, not much was done to publicise
it. So, now we are thinking of visiting each and every household.” According to
officials, there is a lack of awareness among residents and hence only 100
households from the city have registered so far.
The government notification, dated December 3, 2012, made borewell
registration compulsory under the Karnataka Groundwater (Regulation and Control
of Development and Management) Act, 2011. The notification declared BWSSB as
the implementing authority in the city. Existing borewell owners were also
given time till March 31 to register.
More than 300 borewells run dry
every month in Bengaluru. Of the 172,000 borewells in the city, 13,000 have
been drilled by the BWSSB. Nearly 4,000 of these have gone dry, says BWSSB
chief engineer Venkataraju.
City
bursting at the seams
A study by the department of mines and geology states that over 2.4
million people in Bengaluru face the prospect of severe water shortage in the
near future. Going by the growth in population of the city and the water
requirement per person per day, the city harbours about 2.2 million more people
than those who can be provided piped water supply.
According to official data, the demand for water in Bengaluru is
calculated at 140 litres per capita per day (lpcd). For the current population,
the requirement works out to 1,342 million litres per day (mld). The supply of
water from the Cauvery (Stages I to IV, Phase I) and Arkavathy (Hesarghatta and
Tippagondanahalli reservoirs) rivers works out to 975 mld. Conveyance and other
losses reduce the effective supply by 30 per cent to 682 mld. The shortage
therefore works out to 660 mld.
To meet part of the deficit, BWSSB draws water from 7,000 borewells
to supply 35 mld. There are about 105,500 private borewells registered with
BWSSB, from which an estimated 106 mld requirement is met. Then there are over
200,000 unregistered private borewells from which another 200 mld is drawn. The
total supply from groundwater sources is therefore estimated at 341 mld.
Taken together, the overall supply of water, from the Cauvery river as
well as from groundwater sources, to the city is 1,023
mld. On a total demand of 1,342 mld, that still leaves the city with 319 mld
less than the requirement or over 2.2 million people without their quota of
water.
The mining department’s study shows the total recharge of groundwater from
various sources is about 90 mld. Against a withdrawal of 341 mld from the
ground, the recharge is 90 mld. In other words, groundwater is overdrawn by a
massive 378 per cent.
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