National
Platform Against Water Privatisation (NPAWP)
Citizen’s
Front for Water Democracy (CFWD)
To 28th February 2014
Hon’ble Lieutenant
Governor of Delhi
Raj Niwas: 6- Raj Niwas
Marg,
Civil Lines, Delhi-110054
Subject: Not to Discontinue the “Life Line Water
Scheme” provided by the
previous government in Delhi .
Dear
Sir,
We are quite
disappointed to know through mainstream media that the “free of cost lifeline
water scheme” started by the previous government in Delhi is at the
threat of being discontinued from the next financial year (2014-15) starting
from 1st of April. Under the scheme, people with
metered connections are entitled to free water of up to 20,000 litres
(20 Kl)per month.
It is quite strange that
the Delhi Jal Board (DJB) has put forward its demand to continue this scheme to
the Central Government but the latter decided to do away with this subsidy in
the Interim Budget for 2014-15. This indicate a thinly disguised attempt by the
Central government to help the private water operators and to push the water
privatization in Delhi
which got impacted with the pronouncement of the free water scheme in Delhi . If this
pro-public and environment friendly scheme be reversed; this will be a big blow
to the fundamental human rights of the people for access to safe water as well
as a big setback to the much-needed positive steps towards conservation of
water through the lifeline water scheme.
Unfortunately, this disturbing
news has come despite a clear direction from your office, after the review
meeting with the Jal Board as well as Delhi governmental officials, where you clearly
expressed that “none of the decision of the former government will be scrapped,
including the scheme to provide 667 litres of free water daily for
domestic consumption to each household having a meter. You also asked the
officials to ensure that the scheme reaches its intended beneficiaries and is
not misused by unscrupulous elements”.
The CFWD and NPAWP have,
time and again, demanded for supply of a minimum
quantity of free of cost lifeline water to the citizens of India ,
particularly to the people of Delhi . In the
Peoples Water Manifesto prepared by us just before the Assembly Election in
five states in November – December 2013, we urged all the key political parties
to give their commitment
to
provide minimum quantity of free of cost potable water to each family member in
those states in order to ensure water security along with the food security
under the National Food Security Act 2013. We firmly believe that food security
can’t be achieved without ensuring water security. Besides that we had also
demanded for the setting up of a network of Piaos (Water kiosk) and public
stand posts in different locations to restore the traditional service of free
water supply to the people, especially the poor, homeless and other destitute
communities on the roads or in jhuggi jhopries, as well as for passerby on the
roads.
On
30th December 2013, the former government in Delhi made an unprecedented
decision for supplying 20 Kilo-liters (KL) of “life line water” per family per
month to each household ‘free of cost’. We
sincerely believe that this scheme would bring multifold benefits to water consumers in Delhi by ensuring
their right to water besides promoting water
conservation through reduction of water consumption by consumers in order to
avail the benefit. This scheme would encourage DJB consumers to use precious
water resource more cautiously and judiciously because every drop of piped
water would count. In this age of high inflation and super increased water
tariff, every household would try their best to conserve this important
resource to keep their consumption below 20Kl to save money on their water
bill. This may result in managing our existing water supplies more efficiently
and it may also help to ensure better water supplies to water deficit areas in
the city. However, if they fail to do so, the consumers would not only be
deprived off the subsidy but would have to cough up much more even if they
exceed their water usage by a liter and would come under the bracket of 21 Kl. This
will also encourage non-metered consumers to get water meters installed to
avail this benefit, thus would encourage better management and auditing of
water supply in Delhi.
The ‘Lifeline Water Scheme’ will be a breakthrough for
water conservation in Delhi. It would achieve what the previous governments
failed to achieve even by spending crores of rupees to create awareness on
water saving and water conservation through awareness drives and
advertisements. We hope that this scheme will bring in incredible results on
water saving through people’s self-governance on water use to avail this
scheme. It is difficult to imagine how much water would be saved but the saved
water would be lifeline for those who are not getting DJB water at present and
can be supplied to water deficit areas.
We
therefore sincerely urge you to please don’t discontinue the lifeline water
scheme in Delhi in order to guarantee fundamental human rights to water and to ensure
water security to the people of Delhi .
Yours’
sincerely,
SA
Naqvi
Convenor,
CFWD
National
Coordinator, NPAWP
No comments:
Post a Comment