As the clock strikes six in the morning, 45-year-old Vidya keeps her sleep at bay, scampering out of her bed, to rush to the motor pump’s switch. The only thing on her mind is that it might be the only time her family gets water through the day. She switches it on before another thought barges into her mind.
“Will I get clean water this time around?” she asks herself as she waits for her water tank to fill up.
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More often than not, East Delhi’s Trilokpuri residents face a rude shock as the water is seldom clean.
Black with bubbles frothing all across, dirty water has become a part of life. According to residents, clean water has become a distant dream for all of them for the past three months.
“We have not received clean water from the taps here for the past three months. Water supply has always been a problem here. Even for the past three-four years, we used to get dirty water. However, back then there were a few stretches of weeks and even months when we used to get clean water. But now, it is not fit for even washing clothes, leaving alone bathing,” said Vidya.
The water reeks of the stench of drainage filling up the contours of Trilokpuri’s lanes. Multiple complaints over the past couple of months have fallen on deaf ears.
“We complained to the MLA a couple of months ago but he did not do anything. Rohit Mehraulia has only lent a deaf ear to us for the longest time,” said Sonia, 40.
The residential areas at Trilokpuri are resettlement colonies where residents were shifted in 1975-76 during the drive to end homelessness.
From Block 1 to Block 4, the situation regarding water supply has been in disarray for a long time.
Accordingly, the residents have also complained to Trilokpuri MLA Mehraulia regarding the failing sewage system as well. However, according to them, no effort was made on his part to allay their issues.
The residents believe the scarcity of clean water may play well into the agenda of the polls this time around since they believe that their vote will go to whoever can solve the problem.
“We had already started trusting a politician, Mehraulia, to help us with our problems but he did not help at all. We make and break the governments, and we will only vote for the one who can fix the issue,” said Rajwala, 42.
Owing to the lack of sufficient water of satisfactory quality, water tankers visit the JJ cluster at Trilokpuri. However, with too many mouths to feed and just two tankers coming to the area, the residents believe it to be not enough.
“Whenever the two tankers come, one of them arrives in front of our locality for the four blocks and the other tanker goes to some of the other blocks on the backside. However, over 1,000 people stay in these four blocks and every day a fight always erupts whenever we have to fill water. Not everyone gets access to water,” said Naveen, 32, who has taken over the duty of rushing to fill water for the entire family.
The residents further added that the tankers have now started visiting less frequently over the past couple of weeks and they have had to make do with buying water from shops just to take a bath.
“We have to buy multiple drums of water from the shops to wash, clean or do anything, for that matter. The water is not fit for anything,” said Ramesh Chandra Goyar, 73.
Goyar has been living in the locality for the past 40 years and has not been witness to such scarcity of water.
Earlier in a conversation with Patriot, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP candidate, Harsh Malhotra, had promised to work on water scarcity problems in East Delhi if voted to power.
Reportedly, the Delhi Jal Board is coming up with more tubewells in the following localities in the future — Rohini, Rithala, Bawana, Model Town, Adarsh Nagar, Sadar Bazar, Chandni Chowk and Ballimaran.
