A new reservoir being constructed near Gandamunda. Telegraph pictures

Bhubaneswar, Feb. 17: They live within city limits but for many residents of Jagamara and Barabari polluted water from open wells is all that they get. More than 3,000 families living here are yet to get water supply through pipelines.

These families continue to depend on open wells and borewells for water which not only becomes scarce during the summer, but is also polluted at times, leading to water-borne diseases.

“During the last two summers, all the areas of the locality suffered from water shortage and I had to call one tanker each from the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) and the Public Health Engineering Organisation (PHEO) to supply drinking water to residents,” said Runu Jena, councillor of Ward No. 29.

She said Gandamunda Basti, a slum in her ward, however, had two tube wells.

But uncontrolled use of borewells was causing depletion of the groundwater level and soon these tube wells would also fail to supply adequate water, the councillor added. Being the local representative of the corporation, she had approached the civic authorities and the PHEO officials on several occasions and the PHEO officials had made a base-line survey of the area. “Two years after that survey, nothing has materialised.”

Suryanarayan Mishra, president of Krishna Garden House Owners’ Society, said: “Both the phases of the society with 160 houses and more than 300 families have to make their own arrangements for water. The PHEO officials should expedite the process of piped water supply. Otherwise, drawing too much groundwater will deplete the groundwater table of the area. In summer, the quality of water from the borewells also deteriorates.”

A resident of Barabari, Santosh Kumar Patra, rued that even in 2011, people living in the state capital had to draw water from open wells.

“We have one on our premises. But sometime, sewage water gets into the well water. In the rainy season, many residents of Barabari suffer from water-borne diseases.”

Pradeep Kumar Pradhan, a businessman and local resident of Jagamara, said it was high time the authorities thought about covering all areas in the capital with piped-water supply.

“When the city is yet to be connected with a dependable sewerage disposal system, the use of open wells will certainly cause health-related disasters,” he said. A shopkeeper at Jagamara Square, Ratikanta Patra, said: “It is strange that despite the pipeline passing in front our shops we cannot get a connection. PHEO officials said they would not get the water connection unless we came to the office with applications of 50 to 100 persons.”

The local councillor said she had submitted a proposal to the BMC council and the authorities had assured that steps would be taken during the current fiscal year to address the issue. The executive engineer, Division I of PHEO, Chittaranjan Mohanty, said the entire area from Khandagiri to Pokhariput was left out from the piped water supply network as there was no pipeline to the area from the major treatment plant near Mundali. He said, however, that after water connection from Mundali was available the Khandagiri-Pokhariput stretch would be included in the piped water supply scheme and it would automatically cover Jagamara and Barabari.

“This year we will include a proposal for laying pipelines in the area. After its inclusion in the budget of the housing and urban development department, the process will start within a year,” he added.