Guwahati Municipal Corporation (GMC) can meet the water demand of only 30% population

"All together approximately 30,500 house connections are provided from the GMC water supply network. A WTP has a life of around 40 years. The condition of our plants is very bad and due to old mechanism we cannot treat water in an efficient way," said the source while taking to The Sentinel.

The Guwahati Municipal Corporation has three water supply treatment plants at Panbazar, Satpukhuri and Kamakhya. Commissioned in the year 1963, the Panbazar plant has an installed capacity of 45 MLD that has decreased to 25 MLD. The Satpukhuri water treatment plant (WTP) that was commissioned in 1930 and later renovated again in 1984, had a capacity of filtering 22.5 MLD that has decreased to 15 MLD now. Also, the GMC Kamakhya WTP capacity decreased from 4.5 MLD to 3.5 MLD.

Besides these plants, there are 8 functional deep wells at different locations of the city. The deep tube wells has an installed capacity of 2 MLD however, their present output is 1.5 MLD. Apart from this, the GMC has 12 mobile water tankers of different capacity through which water is supplied within the Corporation area.

Further, the source underlined that, "In 2012, a project was taken by Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) and Gammon under which the whole supply distribution system would come under the Jal Board. The project would have solved the water crisis however, it was not completed."

The source pointed out that the Corporation is also facing an 'employee crisis.'

"We have a 50 per cent shortage of workers who supply water. From March, due to the lockdown, many of our workers are facing different types of problems. Many of them were stranded in different places and some have lost the enthusiasm to work," the source asserted.

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