HYDERABAD: Secunderabad Cantonment Board is facing problems in plenty with community borewells in all eight wards, having to maintain them and also pay the monthly electricity bills. But borewells in other areas do not have proper power connections.
Borewells were laid using MLA and MP funds ('2 lakh to '4 lakh on an average for each) for meeting the water demand, especially during summer, in these areas.
There were eight wards in the cantonment and each has roughly 60 community borewells. With summer season having started, the electricity department was on a special drive to inspect the wells. In slums and bastis where locals were found to tap power illegally by attaching a wire to overhead cables, the department staff was cracking the whip. Such lines were being removed and locals were told to get new power connections and pay monthly bills regularly to use the borewell.
The electricity department drive has put the SCB in a tight spot. It is spending '25 lakh per month already for maintenance and power bills for nearly half of the 500 odd community wells.
Owing to irregular water supply in some bastis, community borewells were the only way for people to meet their daily needs. In such a scenario, if half of the wells went without power supply, it would hit the people hard.
SCB top brass has decided to regularise all borewells that did not have a proper power connection and meters. It would also bear the monthly bills of the wells in slums and bastis. However, 100 odd colonies that have such community borewell facility would be told to bear power bills on their own, while SCB would take care of maintenance and repairs, if any.
Officials said they are identifying wells that had to be regularised in various wards and a clear picture of the number would be known in coming days.
SCB vice-president J. Rama Krishna said people in slums and bastis depended on community borewells in view of irregular water supply. Hence, they were taking necessary steps to restore the facility on priority basis.
They would meet higher-ups seeking relaxations or waiving of power bills for community wells.
