Puri 1st Indian city to supp clean drinking water 24x7
On Saturday morning, Odisha housing and urban development minister Pratap Jena filled a glass with water from one of the several water fountains installed on Grand Road leading to the Jagannath Temple before drinking it. As camera flashes went off and TV news reporters swarmed around, Jena also put his mouth close to the water source and drank from it to emphasise the state government’s latest announcement of Puri becoming the first Indian city where one can “drink straight from the tap”.
While Jena exhorted everyone to drink from the taps, newspapers and TV channels in Odisha have been awash with government advertisements about the holy town becoming the first Indian city to have 24-hour safe drinking water facility like that in London and Singapore. The scheme, named Sujal, was first launched in October last year by chief minister Naveen Patnaik in a pilot mode with an aim to provide clean drinking water from taps to 1.5 million people in 15 towns of Odisha by March 2022. The deadline has been revised to October 2023. On Monday, Puri became the first such city with Patnaik’s announcement.
“While other cities in India like Mumbai, Delhi or Chennai may be providing clean drinking water, it is surely not available for entire 24 hours. Our system is fully automated to correct any anomaly in the supply of clean drinking water through taps to all households in the city. The water from taps is now ready for consumption without any more filtration,” said Odisha housing and urban development secretary G Mathivathanan.
In several neighbourhoods of Puri town, the reactions to the government claim have been a mix of incredulity and mild approval. Most of the households now sport pipes fitted with meters at one end to keep a tab on the usage of water. Sabita Das, a 71-year-old woman in Puri’s Haragouri Sahi, one of the several people having 24-hour water supply lines, said the water the government now provides through tap tastes different. “For the last several years, I have been drinking water from a water purifier. I somehow don’t like the taste of this water,” she said. Sanjib Kumar Panda in Duttatota Sahi of Puri said the water being supplied was not of great quality, while Rashmita Mallick of Mangalahat area said the water quality is now good. “The water pressure is good, but it sometimes smells of chlorine.”
Before the tap water scheme was made operational, people like Mallick and Panda in the seaside town received their drinking water from groundwater sucked up by massive pumps in the Baliapanda area. The water was lifted to overhead tanks and then chlorinated before being supplied to houses. Some drew water from their own borewells or handpumps which they either boiled and filtered before drinking.
Under the Sujal scheme, the government now draws water from the Bhargavi river flowing near the town. The water is then channelised to a reservoir and then sent to a treatment plant at Samang just outside the town through huge pipes. There, it goes through several processes including chlorination before being sent through a network of pipes to 250,000 people in the city. While the water demand of Puri town is about 32-34 million litres per day, the plant purifies 42 million litres.
“As contamination of the water is a huge issue wh supplied, we elimina problem by maintaini quate water pressure an ity. In case there is a lea only goes out from the spot and does not allow side material to enter t The moment a leak happ engineers can check th water pressure through app called Jaljantri and t rect it... If the chlori drops, the system sense the chlorine doser autom starts the chlorination so that some amount of chlorine remains in the maintain its purity Mathivathanan. Besi mobile testing laborato around the city for regul ity monitoring and surv
Experts say that to water that can be had from the tap anywhere i the water quality has to to at least 30-odd param IS 10500 of BIS. “This s has acceptable and per limits. If any parameter the limit, the water is co unfit for human consum said Dr Bharat Sharma researcher at New Delh national Water Mana Institute.
PK Swain, managing of Water Supply Corpor Odisha, government c looking after operati maintenance of water s the state said the wate now being supplied un Sujal scheme conform 10500 specifications.