Brace for water tariff hike

Hyderabad: The Hyderabad Metropolitan Water Supply and Sewerage Board (HMWS&SB) is mulling a hike in water tariff, claiming that it has to incur extra financial burden as it was getting 45 MGD of water to city under Krishna phase-III project. While the quantum of hike in tariff for this reason is yet to get the government’s nod, the water board had recently started levying service charges which range between Rs 10 and Rs 150 on domestic consumers.

As if that was not enough they have now found another new method to burn a bigger hole in the pockets of the consumers. The water board is levying additional pumping charges to the tune of Rs 45 per connection. When questioned on the issue, the officials said that there are about 100 overhead reservoir tanks under GHMC limits.

Many places that are covered by these reservoirs are in the higher areas and the board has to incur higher power charges to supply water to these areas. While on record, officials claim that there are only about 57,000 such connections, sources point out that the actual number of connections would be over a lakh. The board claims that it charges Rs 3 per kilo litre of water. It also levies sewerage cess of 33 percent and service charge which could go up to a maximum of Rs 45.

This has resulted in a hike of over Rs 50 per month. Since the commissioning of the 45 MGD out of the total 90 MGD planned, under the Krishna Drinking Water Supply Project (KDWSP) Phase III, the Water Board started incurring an additional expenditure of Rs 12 cr per month towards electricity charges for pumping water from Akkampally. As a

result the Water Board is facing a deficit of Rs 3-5 cr per month. The board spent Rs 8 cr for eight pumps of which four are operational.

A senior official said that once the second instalment of 45 MGD too is commissioned which is expected by the end of June, the expenditure would go up. In addition, it has set up a target of one lakh new connections for 2015-16. The board has to receive Rs 272 cr from government departments out of which Rs 140 cr is due from rural water supply. On an average the board’s revenue per month is Rs 90 cr while the expenditure was on the higher side.

Hence, the Water Board has prepared a detailed report on the losses it is incurring and submitted it to the Chief Minister who is also the chairman of the Water Board. The officials are expecting the nod from him anytime soon. Executive director M Satyanarayana said, “There can be cross-subsidy and tariff could be increased to consumers who can afford it. There are about 3000 high end consumers,” he said. Meanwhile, CPI (M) city secretary M Srinivas criticised the move of the government to hike water tariff.

This goes contrary to the claims of the government which has promised to give free water connections, he said. Diddi Rambabu, former floor leader of Congress party said that this has exposed the double standards of the Telangana government. On one hand the Chief Minister claims that he will provide water for all and will not seek votes if he fails to do so and on the other hand the water board is contemplating to hike the tariff.

The Congress will launch protests against the government if it gives its nod for the hike, he said. K Kiranmayee Kishore, Ramgopalpet ex-corporator said that the water board’s plans of increasing service charges are not acceptable. The government should see that the white ration card holders do not get affected at any cost.