The Rajshahi city dwellers are experiencing acute water crisis currently as the water plants are failing to supply sufficient water. The water pumps and tube wells in the city cannot lift enough water from underground to meet the public demand. At present the Rajshahi Water Supply and Sewerage Authorities are supplying water using 70 deep tube wells and one surface water treatment plant.
The water crisis may even deepen as the surface water treatment plant is going to be stopped with the River Padma going dry gradually, the Rajshahi WASA officials have said.
Residents of Dhorompur, Mirzapur, Dashmari, Bodhpara, Meherchandi, Satabongram, Binodpur, Kazla, Talaimari, Shiroil, Lakshmipur Bhatapara, Ponchaboti, Hazrapukur, Horogram, Rajshahi court area and some parts of Upashahar and residents of the dormitories of several educational institutes are the worst sufferers.
Monowara Begum, resident of Darikharbona in the city, has said they are facing extreme water crisis daily.
Tarikul Islam, a resident of Hetomkhan, has said they collect water from tube wells to meet their daily needs but the tube wells in the area are now failing to lift adequate water.
The RWASA caretaker engineer, Parvez Ahmed, has said the per head need for water is at least 145 liters per day but the authorities hardly supply 108 liters per head.
He has informed that 67 per cent people of the city are getting water from the RWASA and the rest are still out of coverage.
Parvez has said in the previous year, the RWASA supplied water for 65 per cent people and after setting up 36 kilometre new pipelines, 2 per cent more people have been brought under the coverage.
He says that the water supply has reduced because of sharp depletion of groundwater.
Around 2,000 tube wells in the city are inoperative and 1,500 more are unable to lift required water for the same reason, the WASA official has said.
Many of the city residents are meeting their needs of drinking water purchasing mineral water and some businessmen are making profit on it.
The hydro-geologist, Choudhury Sarwar Jahan Sajol, and also the Rajshahi University pro-vice chairman, has said the underground water level has gone down by 35 to 40 feet in the city areas and 85 to 110 feet in the Barind tract, including Godagari, Tanore, Bangmara, Puthia and Durgapur, creating severe crisis of drinking water.
The Rajshahi Public Health Engineering Department executive engineer, Bahar Uddin Mridha, has said at least 50 per cent of the tube wells and Tara pumps installed by the RPHED in different upazilas of the district are not functioning at present.
-With New Age input
