The depleting ground water table across urban and rural areas of Garhwa district has reached alarming level posing a serious threat to normal life. This besides, interrupted power supply has also added to the woes of the people here.

According to a report, the ground water table has depleted by about 2 ft compared to the previous year. This has resulted in all wells and ponds drying up leading to a severe drinking water crisis in localities like Tandwa, Sai, Nagwan, Dipwan, Purani Bazar, Eraqui, Dom toil, Pathan Toli and parts of Sonpurwa, Garhdevi and Unchri.

To tide over the crisis, the district administration has made several arrangements to provide drinking water in urban areas. Drinking water is being supplied to Garhwa town residents through tankers. Moreover, sanitation of wells and repair of defunct hand pumps are being carried out on a war footing. But rural areas of the district are still reeling under acute drinking water crisis as the administration has not been made arrangements to supply water to tghe populace there.

Meanwhile, acting on complaints from residents of various localities of the town, DC directed the executive engineer of drinking water and sanitation department to ensure adequate water supply through tankers to localities where the problem has taken alarming form. The DC has also directed SDMs of all the three sub-divisions Garhwa, Ranka and Nagar Untari to ensure safe drinking water supply in the rural areas.

This apart, the DC has directed power department for uninterrupted power supply daily from 4 am to 10 am so that water may be supplied smoothly.

The district administration has decided to send tankers to community centres like schools and religious places to disburse drinking water so that more people have opportunity to get water as sending tankers to individual houses leads to squabble over sharing water. It has also decided to pump out water from deep bore by means of submersible pumps. Efforts are also on to lift water by submersible pumps from those hand pumps that are in good working order.

A new technique of river bank filteration is also being adopted to lift water from aquifers located near the banks of river containing underground water, sources said.

Apart from Garhwa town, the rural areas suffering from acute water crisis include Bhandaria, Bargarh, Majhiaon, Dhurki, Bhawnathpur, Meral, Ramna and parts of Ranka Ramkanda and Nagar Untari. 

3 May 2009, TNN