India TV Chairman and Editor-in-Chief Rajat Sharma.
For the last three weeks, there has been hue and cry over water shortage in Delhi. Forget about slums and unauthorised colonies, now even VIPs living in Lutyens’ Zone have to buy water. In Delhi’s VVIP areas, Parliament House, Supreme Court, Delhi High Court, Rashtrapati Bhavan, bungalows and flats of ministers, officers, MPs, even government hospitals like Ram Manohar Lohia, Lady Hardinge and Kalawati Sharan are facing water shortage. On Tuesday, two tankers supplied water to Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital. One tanker of water was sent to Maharashtra Sadan. Demand for water is coming from the houses of ministers and MPs. Water supply is not being done in bungalows and markets of posh areas of Delhi like Gol Market, Jorbagh, Bengali Market, Khan Market which come under NDMC.
In fact, Delhi Jal Board supplies water to NDMC area. The daily water supply in this area is 125 million liters which has now come down to 70 to 75 MLD. NDMC is trying to supply water from its reservoirs but it is not getting water supply from Delhi Jal Board. NDMC Vice President Satish Upadhyay said that in 10 years Arvind Kejriwal did nothing to improve the water supply in Delhi, every year in summer there is a water problem and Aam Aadmi Party leaders blame the Haryana government for this and the public suffers.
NDMC area gets water from three water treatment plants of Delhi – Wazirabad plant supplies water to Parliament House, Lady Harding Hospital, Ram Manohar Lohia and Kalawati Hospital, Chandrawal plant supplies water to Rashtrapati Bhavan, Prime Minister’s residence, ministers’ houses and embassies’ area, Sonia Vihar plant supplies water to Khan Market and other NDMC markets. There has been no water supply from Wazirabad plant for the last two days due to which water supply to three hospitals has been affected. Supply has also reduced in Parliament House. It is worth noting that the session of Parliament has not started yet, the session will start from June 24, at that time there will be more need of water here. NDMC claims that Parliament House will not be allowed to face water shortage. NDMC board member Kuldeep Chahal said that if the Kejriwal government had planned in advance, such a situation would not have arisen. There are big bungalows, offices and markets in Ashok Road, Janpath, Bengali Market, Khan Market, Tilak Marg, Jor Bagh.
On Tuesday, India TV’s correspondent saw people waiting for water tankers in front of big bungalows in these areas. Water supply was happening in these areas at one time, but now that too has stopped. Water has run out in many houses and markets. People are managing by buying water from the market. They are requesting NDMC to send water. After a long wait, water tanks of houses are being filled through water tankers. The situation is even worse in the market area. There is tremendous heat in Delhi and surrounding areas. The day temperature reaches 45 degrees. The heat is up to 40 degrees even at night. In such a situation, water shortage can be fatal. That is why people are ready to die for a bucket of water and this situation has been going on for many days. But today the biggest concern was that news of water shortage came from hospitals where there are patients and hostels where there are students.
It is true that the government knew beforehand that it would be hot and there would be water shortage, but no planning was done. The Delhi government kept blaming Haryana, the Haryana government kept giving explanations. The result is that today the people of Delhi are troubled, forced to crave for every drop of water and the sad thing is that even after seeing all this, the leaders did not stop doing politics on the issue of water. It would be better if the leaders do not do politics on the Delhi water crisis. (Rajat Sharma)
Watch: ‘Aaj Ki Baat, Rajat Sharma Ke Sath’ full episode of June 18, 2024
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