KENDRAPARA: Demanding potable water, residents of Baro, Tarando, Trilochanpur and nearby villages staged dharna in front of the project office of Rural Water Supply and Sanitation (RWSS) department here on Monday.
The agitators claimed while the area is in the grip of acute drinking water crisis, the authorities concerned have not made any sincere effort to address the issue.
Manorama Behera of Tarando said, “In the past, we had urged the authorities several times to supply water to our villages through pipelines or tankers. But our pleas fell on deaf ears.” Due to shortage of potable water, a large number of villagers are forced to use contaminated water from ponds and other sources. The crisis will escalate in the coming days in absence of adequate drinking water, she claimed.
Similarly, Tapan Das of Trilochanpur village said the water that comes through taps in some of the houses is mixed with sewage water, and it cannot be used for cooking or bathing. The problem of contaminated drinking water is due to wrong laying of the sewerage system.
“Joints of sewerage pipes have loosened, resulting in mixing of sewerage with drinking water. The situation has assumed such alarming proportions that we fear an epidemic outbreak in our village,” he said.
Sources said deprived of safe drinking water, villagers have to stand in serpentine queues near the tube-wells for long hours to collect water.
Contacted, executive engineer of RWSS Basant Nayak said in 2021, an overhead tank was constructed at Tarando to supply drinking water to locals through pipelines. Few areas are facing problems recently due to leakage and illegal water connection.
Nayak informed that some families have been stealing water by illegally tapping the pipelines. Due to this reason, the RWSS is facing problems in supplying sufficient water to all the consumers. Besides, the electricity officials have recently snapped power supply in the villages as many consumers did not pay their bills. Without electricity, the water supply has also been stopped. “We are repairing all the damaged pipelines on a war-footing to provide clean drinking water to all the villagers soon,” he added.