Water woes in Jaipur: Private tankers suck wallets dry

Jaipur: With temperature soaring high, the demand for water has increased and Jaipur residents are now shelling out a premium to buy water from private tankers.

As the demand for tankers are increasing, the rate of tanker water has seen a hike of around four times the normal price.

In a few areas of Walled City, the residents were forced to buy water for no less than Rs 2,000, when the normal price of a tanker water is Rs 300 to Rs 500 in Jaipur.

“For the last few days, we are facing severe water crisis at our residence. After much pursuance at the local circle office of the public health engineering department (PHED), we decided to buy water from the private tankers. The rate they offered was shocking. After much negotiation, we paid Rs 2,200 for a 4,000 litre of water,” said Amit Prakash Saini, a resident adjacent to the City Palace in the Walled City area.

Speaking to TOI, even the PHED officials also admitted that this year there is a severe crisis in water supply in different localities of Jaipur, mostly in the areas of Vidhyadhar Nagar, Jhotwara, Jagatpura, Kho Nagoriyon and inside the Walled City. The engineers claimed this is because the demand is much higher than the supply from Bisalpur Dam.

“We are transferring around 600 MLD of water at present whereas the present requirement is close to 700 MLD. The demand has increased not only because of the temperature. The department has given rampant connections to new areas under the previous government and as a result the requirement has increased. To add on, several houses in the city are still illegally using booster pumps to suck more water from our pipelines and despite our best efforts we could not trace all of these errant consumers. In all the situation is in a mess,” said a PHED engineer. Owners of the tankers have claimed that Rs 2,000 is indeed an exorbitant rate. But, this year, the rate for private tankers would definitely cross the Rs 1,500 mark in Jaipur. The owners have claimed this is not only because of the demand, but also because of the hike in license fees for private tankers the government initiated in 2023.

“The rate of our license fees has increased severely last year. Now a tanker owner had to shelve out Rs 23,000 – Rs 25,000 to get a license fee to make a boring and supply water from the boring on their tankers across the city. The government is not taking actions against tankers operating without proper licences. Then from where the ‘genuine’ tanker owners would make their profit?” said Prakash Saini, one of the 2,000-odd tanker owners of the city.