Nagamani P V, a resident of Byatarayanapura New Extension received Cauvery water connection from Bangalore Water Supply And Sewerage Board (BWSSB) in 1995. She is worried as their water meter is 17 years old and it might show a wrong reading. There are hundreds of such consumers whose water meters are yet to be replaced free of cost by the BWSSB.
“According to the norms, the BWSSB has to replace water meters which are seven years old. All the existing Class ‘A’ single jet water meters, which are seven years old will be replaced by the advanced Class ‘B’ multi-jet meters,” BWSSB’s Engineer-in-chief T Venkatraju said.
As BWSSB is now aiming to increase the water connections to 8.5 lakh from the existing 6.5 lakh connections in a period of 20 weeks, its plan, chalked out in October 2009, to replace water meters which are seven years old, has taken a back seat. It had taken up this initiative at a cost of Rs 16 crore after receiving complaints about erratic reading. The complaints had gone up to a whooping 554 till June.
BWSSB Engineer-in-chief T Venkatraju, admitting the fact that this task has taken a back seat now, told Express, “We are giving prominence to new connections for which water will be supplied through Cauvery IV Stage, II Phase project. The replacement of old meters is going on in phased manner.” When asked on how many water meters have been replaced so far, he said, “There are about three lakh meters which are more than seven years old and more than 50 per cent have been replaced.” G R Babukumar, Assistant Chief Engineer (Maintenance), said, “The Cauvery IV Stage, II Phase project is going to be commissioned shortly and it brings 500MLD of water to the city. Our priority is to provide new connections and install water meters as they are the real source of income now.”
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