Illegal Hydrants: ‘This is the last straw’

Residents set to take to the streets against illegal water connections.

KARACHI: The residents of the Defence Housing Authority, Clifton, and its surrounding areas are on the verge of taking to the roads after having exhausted all peaceful means of having illegal hydrants removed, announced Aziz Suharwardy, general secretary of the Defence Association’s Coordination Committee (DACC) at a press conference on Wednesday.

According to Suhawardy, there are at least 29 hydrants at the main water pipeline that begins at Pipri Pumping Station of which 25 have been set up illegally while three are private and one belongs to the Karachi Water and Sewerage Board (KWSB) itself. This last legal hydrant is near the CBC pumping station at Chakra Goth and it heavily exceeds its approved water intake of 0.3 million gallons a day (MGD), he alleged. He claimed that all the water tankers seen at Qayyumabad are filled through these four hydrants at Chakra Goth.

“After trying whatever we could legally, we are here in front of the national media to share our plight and let the authorities know that now we will take our struggle to another degree by thronging the roads in protest,” said Suharwardy, who is also a member of Clifton Cantonment Board (CBC).

Suharwardy told the media that they will sit at Submarine Chowk in Clifton Block VIII and block traffic but did not mention a date.

“What led us to stop pursuing this matter through peaceful means is the National Assembly meeting on September 17 in which, the water board’s managing director - the most important person who could resolve this matter, did not even bother showing up or sending a representative,” said Suharwardy.

“Even members of the National Assembly said that the managing director should he held in contempt by the assembly.” The general secretary brushed aside questions about corruption within the CBC claiming that corruption is rampant in our society everywhere, so it cannot be disregarded within the CBC either. “However, the fact that we are receiving only 6 MGD as compared to our requirement of 14 MGD, reduces the significance of this corruption.”

Suharwardy also dismissed claims that the CBC acquires water through the KWSB on discounted rates. “We pay the very same price to the KWSB as the rest of the residents of Karachi.” He called the water tanker services a ‘multi-billion rupee riotous mafia’ backed by major political parties. “The Corps Commander Karachi once sent a force to shut down the illegal hydrants along the main pipeline but called the personnel back after just three days without achieving any significant results,” he alleged.

The DHA residents’ representative, Asad Kizilbash, told the gathering that the CBC consists of 60,000 tax assessed houses of about seven people per house. They require 14 mgd of water based on the United Nation’s minimum requirement of 35 gallons per person a day.

The CBC receives water from the main station at Chakra Goth and the Zamzama bulk station. Till September 1999, when a memorandum of understanding was signed between the CBC and the KWSB, that ensured nine MGD supply of water, the CBC was receiving four MGD of water. Afterwards, the chairman of KWSB approved the supply of a further three MGD of water in 2006 through the K-III water supply scheme.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 29^th,  2011.