Acute water crisis hits many areas in Dhaka

Highlights:

• Residents in Mohammadpur, Bhashantek, Bhatara, Matikata, Aftabnagar, Badda and Bhatara areas cannot meet their needs even after buying lorry water from Wasa
• The most affected are the elderly and children in these areas
• Residents complain that they are not getting any remedy despite repeatedly contacting Wasa
• Wasa has assured residents that the problem will be resolved within the next one or two days

Many areas in the capital, such as Mohammadpur, Bhashantek, Bhatara, Matikata, Aftabnagar, Badda and Bhatara, have been experiencing severe water shortages for the past few days.

Residents of these areas cannot meet their needs even after buying water from the lorries of Dhaka Water Supply and Sewerage Authority (Wasa). 

According to the Wasa authorities, deep tube wells in some places have been out of order while new ones are being installed in some other areas. That has exacerbated the crisis. Wasa has assured residents that the problem will be resolved within the next one or two days.

Ongoing load shedding is also hampering its regular operations, said Wasa officials.

Several lakh people in different areas of Dhaka city are immensely suffering from load shedding and acute water shortage. The most affected are the elderly and children in these areas. Residents complain that they are not getting any remedy despite repeatedly contacting Wasa.

Baitul Aman Housing Society in Mohammadpur Adabar has not had water supplies from Wasa for the past three days. Residents in the locality have not been able to meet their demand even by buying lorry water from Wasa.

Mahtab Hossain, a resident of a housing society, told The Business Standard that there was no Wasa water supply in his building for three days.

"It is not possible to meet the demand even by buying lorry water from Wasa. So we are forced to buy bottled water and do our necessary work. Even after repeatedly reporting the matter to Wasa, we did not find any solution," he added.

For about 15 days, none of the houses in Aftab Nagar's A and B blocs have received fresh water from Wasa. Residents of this area said that due to water shortage, they are unable to do any daily essential work, such as cooking, eating and bathing.

Laboni Akhtar, a resident of Bhatara Khilbarirtek, told TBS, "We face a water crisis in summer every year. This year the crisis has worsened. We have to store water when it is available in the morning and use it during the rest of the day. Sometimes the water supply is there after 2/3 days."

He said that many house owners have secretly installed tube wells to solve their water problems. Even if they have a Wasa line in their houses, the main needs for water are met with the tube wells.

"But since we don't have this system, we have to depend on Wasa water," he added.

Mohammad Ashraful Habib Choudhury, Wasa's executive engineer in the Mirpur area, declined to provide any information about the water crisis.

"I cannot provide you with the information. You have to collect all such information from the Wasa head office," he added.

Syed Mostakim Hossain, Wasa's executive engineer in the Mohammadpur zone, said that there are problems in Shekhertek and Baitul Aman housing areas.

"It will take one to two days to solve the problems," he told TBS, adding that a new deep tube well is being installed in one area and one is being repaired in the other area.

"But we are trying to maintain water supply through other pumps. Besides, load shedding is disrupting our normal work," said the engineer.

He said, in some areas, the city corporation has blocked Wasa pipeline switches by carpeting the streets, which is also creating a problem.

Syed Mostakim Hossain also said that the pumps are not able to meet demand as the population is increasing every year in various areas of Dhaka.

However, according to data available with Wasa, it has the capacity to produce about 270 crore litres of water per day. Of this, 91 crore litres are produced from treatment plants, and the remaining 179 crore litres come from deep tube wells.

The demand for water in the capital is 210-240 million litres per day, according to the data.

Dhaka Wasa says that water extraction from pumps is getting disrupted due to load shedding 2/3 times a day recently. Besides, owing to the decrease in the groundwater level, water shortage has occurred in some areas.

Wasa claims that there is no problem with the water line anywhere. 

The government agency is boring afresh more than 100 pumps out of about 920 in Dhaka to solve the water problem. Wasa says that once the boring work is completed, the water problem will be solved substantially.

Apart from this, once the Gandharbpur Drinking Water Treatment Plant is commissioned in Rupganj of Narayanganj, dependence on underground water will be reduced to a large extent, Wasa added.