BENGALURU: Bangalore Water Supply WSSB on Saturday constituted a four-member special inquiry committee to investigate the huge losses caused to it in Kuvempu Layout and S M V Layout in Kengeri village due to non-payment of various charges.
A BWSSB official said the committee has been given a 15-day deadline to finish its inquiry and submit its findings to the Board chairman.
The committee members are BWSSB Financial Adviser and Chief Administrative Officer R Ramanna, Additional Chief Engineer (Revenue Improvement) H M Ravindra, Accounts Officer, Internal Audit Wing, S Prasanna Kumar, and former BWSSB chief V Balasubramanian.
“The committee has been given full powers to probe extensively into the issues,” said the official. The team has also been asked to take the assistance of the Engineer-in-Chief, if required.
The charges levelled against the two layouts include non-payment or reduced payment of pro-rata, non-payment of Greater Bengaluru Water Supply and Sewerage Project (GBWASP) charges, linkage charges; effluent treatment plant charges and No-Objection certification charges, which has resulted in considerable loss to the Board.
Pro-rata charges refer to the one-time payment that upcoming residential or commercial establishments need to pay while taking water and sanitary connections while the GBWASP charge is applicable to newly-added BBMP areas towards setting up water and sanitary infrastructure.
These violations came to light during inspections conducted by maintenance officials last month to reduce the unaccounted for water levels in Greater Bangalore, the official added.
These layouts are among the 150 which BWSSB identified recently as causing huge losses to the tune of nearly Rs 300 crore by non-payment of various charges to it.
Work on New STP Begins
The ground-breaking ceremony for a 600 million litres per day (MLD) sewage treatment plant at Kengeri was conducted by BWSSB chairman T M Vijay Bhaskar on Saturday. BWSSB already has STPs, prominent among which are Vrishabhavati Valley (180 MLD), Mylasandra (75 MLD) and Nagawara (20 MLD) which will have another 20 MLD capacity added soon.