[Reader-list] 2nd posting-Water Lenses

Sun Mar 5 13:46:54 IST 2006

2nd Posting: 
Working Title: WATER LENSES 
Prelude for new imagination for urban water of Mumbai.

After making my intial argument and identifying lense for further investigating, presenting some of the stories:

A story of Pakhaliwallas: 
The name Pakhali-walla comes from the word Pakhali or Masak, which means, a leather bag that is used to carry and distribute water. A Khaki colored shirt and lungi is the prominent dress code which they follow and is inherited from their ancestors, who use to water the dusty roads of Bombay during colonial period. This cult inhabits on the streets of Bhuleshwar (part of an indigenous core of old city of Mumbai) and works under a master who happens to pay them daily/monthly wages. The job is to collect the water from the water cart in the Pakhali and distribute to the surrounding area as per the need. The master has about 8-10 Pakhaliwallas and is responsible for the day to day functioning of his business. The prospective clients in this case are not fixed and ranges from the hawkers in the vicinity to migrant community working in the small enterprises. 
The existence of this particular water distribution system depend on the other systems which are positioned in the same area and include, the temple complex from the water is pumped into the hand carts, which has about 5000 liters capacity of water tank. The cart in turn is operated by two people, who are only responsible to carry water from source (temple complex) to the main distribution place (street where the entire group resides).In this case the cart is owned by the master, but if required the water can be bought from the other water cart puller, who work independently as the owner of the cart.
The entire supply chain depends only on one well which is in the temple complex and is surviving since the year 1700. Presently the temple is owned by the trust and is part of the residential and small commercial development. Other than supplying water of the well to the residents, the trusts forefront agenda is to gain some money by selling water to the water vendors. An elaborate pumping system is developed from the well to the main entrance of the temple complex, where it is operated by person in charge for this system and is appointed by the trust. This guy also interacts with water vendors and is responsible for collection of money and maintaining daily accounts. The well is not recharged by any means and still has perennial source and holds a myth that the water will not dry for ever by the grace of the GOD in the temple and it should be removed continuously to avoid the overflow. In this way the trust gains some money for the maintenance of the complex and also expresses
 goodwill for the society by providing water.

A story of Contractor: 
A building contractor undertook a petite work of repair of a building in Chunnabhatti, which is an area in central suburban part of Mumbai. The repair work was very simple and diminutive and involved mainly the plastering work of the building, but was time consuming since it was spanned between the months of monsoon.
The contractor being  exposed to the method of water harvesting, he devised a mechanism to reduce the cost of the project and in turn wanted to try out the model for water conservation practice during construction period.
He calculated the number of water tankers needed to carry out the entire repair work. It was about Rs.30,000/- as per 50-55 tankers that were needed at the cost of Rs.600 per tanker. More over in such arrangements, the hidden cost is about 20% of the basic cost, which includes delivery of tanker, workers sitting idle or loss of quantity during transport. Hence the total outlay would be more likely to be around Rs. 35,000/-. Alternately, he designed and constructed a temporary tank in the side open space of the building with the capacity of 5, 50,000 liters and it costed him around Rs. 14,000/- with saving or profit of almost Rs. 21 thousand.
Further with his kind concern for the conservation of the water in the city, he proposed the society member to continue the system and explained them the importance of the system in context of reducing the dependency on the municipal supply. Out rightly the proposal was rejected by the members due to the mere operational and capital cost that was involved in it. Hence the tank was destroyed by the contractor as he left the site after completing his work.   

A story of Pani Committee:
Members of Pani Committee provide voluntary services and largely include team of youngsters. The job of the committee is to serve drinking water to the community coming in for their daily prayers in Jamat Khana (community center). They are more active during evening prayer hours and periodical auspicious days. The pani committee has a designated space in the Jamat Khana and roles and responsibilities of the members are well defined. This particular activity of extending services by becoming a part of the pani committee provides an individual opportunity to offer their voluntary social services to their community, which is one of the mainstay of Ismaili constitution. The cost involved in the operations and maintenance of the committee and its activity is completely subsidized by the co-operative housing society (CHS) where the Jamat Khana is positioned, becoming a part of larger residential complex in one of the dense areas of Mumbai called as Dongri. Being an indigenous core of
 Mumbai, the housing and water supply network in the society and vicinity is about 80-100 years old and has shown many alterations and additions. The initial water supply to the Society was thru centralized system and was sufficient enough to generate the pressure for elevating the water from ground to upper two floors without pumping. In consequent years, extra floors were added and need was felt to construct an underground tank within the society premise. The entire supply network was imbalanced which resulted into installation of booster pumps at individual household, connected directly to the main municipal water pipe. Presently percentage supply to the household completely depends upon the efficiency of the booster pump installed and the family member operating it.  

TUSHAR BHOR
ARCHITECT and INDEPENDENT RESEARCHER.
  Residence Address: 
10/60, Madhu Sadan,Sion(w),Mumbai400022,Maharashtra,India.
Tel. No: +91 22 24083828.
Mobile: +91 98190 35176.
E mail: tushar_bhor at yahoo.com

TUSHAR BHOR
ARCHITECT and INDEPENDENT RESEARCHER.

Residence Address: 
10/60, Madhu Sadan,Sion(w),Mumbai400022,Maharashtra,India.
Tel. No: +91 22 24083828.
Mobile: +91 98190 35176.
E mail: tushar_bhor at yahoo.com

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