KARIMNAGAR: Water tankers allocated for Haritha Haram programme under Karimnagar Municipal Corporation (MCK) jurisdiction are being diverted for commercial purpose by the contractors. MCK authorities allocated five water tankers to protect saplings, but the drivers instead of watering the saplings are selling them to residential colonies.
Since groundwater in many areas is depleted and borewells are unable to pump sufficient water, apartment owners are purchasing water from private tankers to fill their water sumps. Taking advantage of this, water tanker drivers deputed for Haritha Haram are selling the tankers to people in apartments. MCK is providing water to the tankers at LMD filter bed for Haritha Haram. Some water tankers are watering the saplings and some others are misusing them. Water per tanker is being sold at `400 to apartments and they are using it for non-drinking purpose.
According to sources, in 2017 MCK had planted about 1 lakh saplings in its jurisdiction. There is no proper count on how many saplings survived. Due to poor maintenance and lack of initiative, almost all roadside saplings have weathered. To protect the saplings, Mayor S Ravinder Singh had taken an initiative and launched a novel method in which, disposed water bottles are tied to the saplings upside-down thereby providing drip like water to saplings. But it disappeared within a short time.