Bengaluru: People knock on the Raj Bhavan's doors for various reasons, with petitions and memorandums for their pet causes. But the Bengaluru Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB) is having to knock on its doors for an entirely different reason.
Here's a shocker: Along with the Legislators Home, the Raj Bhavan owes it in lakhs in unpaid water bills. In fact, the state police department is the biggest defaulter, owing the agency Rs 6.09 crore in water charges.
And among Central government agencies, the railways owes it Rs 4.64 crore (as in June this year). Not surprisingly the water board is having a hard time recovering arrears of over 14 crore in pending bill payments.
While the office of the commissioner of police on Infantry Road has still to pay the BWSSB Rs 45.5 lakh in water charges, the government Secretariat, the ministers’ quarters, the Legislators’ Home and the Raj Bhavan together owe it Rs 21.5 lakh in unpaid bills.
Water woes
Besides the railways, a Central government concern, NIMHANS owes the BWSSB Rs 10.7 lakhs and Canara Bank has still to pay it Rs 2.8 lakhs in water bills.
Also among the top 15 defaulters in the state are the UVCE Hostel in K.R. Circle run by the education department (Rs 1.91 crore), the police quarters in J.B. Kaval, Krishnandanagara Main Road (Rs 1.28 lakhs), DCP CAR headquarters (Rs 1.2 crore), DCP CAR Central headquarters on Sirsi lane, Mysore Road (Rs 91.7 lakh), the Superintendent of the Health Department located in Victoria Hospital on K.R. Market Fort Road (Rs 78.5 lakh) and the KC General Hospital in Malleshwaram (Rs 61.3 lakh).
While the dues continue to mount, the Revenue Billing and Collection division of the BWSSB seems helpless in recovering them. Although it holds meetings every month to discuss ways to make the defaulters pay up, it has made little progress. In the past it tried to use strong-arm tactics with the police department, but met with little success.
"Its hard to cut off the water connections of hospitals, the Raj Bhavan or Legislators' Home," pointed out BWSSB officers, who are pinning their hopes now on the government stepping in to help the agency recover its dues.
