BENGALURU: The Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board, which could not get its away with a retrospective rule on STPs for apartments with 50 units and above, now aims to seriously implement the rainwater harvesting plan. Of the 1.5 lakh buildings identified in the city, only 80,488 have installed RWH structures on their premises. Board claims to have collected over Rs 15 crore in fines from offenders.
A senior BWSSB engineer, who did not wish to be named, told Deccan Chronicle, “Though the STP rule was in the interest of the city, it did not go down well. Now we have started pursuing our RWH plan a bit aggressively. We have been conducting awareness camps, holding streetplays and organising programmes at the Rainwater Harvesting Theme Park in Jayanagar to stress on the importance of water and how beneficial it is to save rainwater.”
He said, “On one hand, we are spreading awareness and persuading the defaulters to set up RWH structures, while on the other, we are fining the offenders heavily, so that they fall in line.”
He said, “Till date, we have collected fines of up to Rs 15 crore. We are levying a fine of 25 percent of the water bill for the first three months for domestic consumers, followed by 50 percent for the next 6 months of non-compliance and double the water bill thereafter.”
Asked if water connections will be disconnected to offenders for non-compliance for a longer period, he said, “Now, we are only trying to make them fall in line, either through fines or by motivating them. Cutting water supply will be against the board's motive of supplying water. So at present, we will not resort to the move of disconnecting water services."
