Have rainwater harvesting, get bldg clearance: Govt

Mumbai: Permission will not be granted for new buildings in Mumbai unless they have rainwater harvesting facilities. This is what the state government has proposed for construction projects in the city. 

    "The water level in the state's rivers has gone down. Similar is the problem with lakes providing drinking water. People should make sensible use of water. To deal with the issue of water shortage in the city, the water supply department will soon hold a meeting with chief minister Prithviraj Chavan and BMC officials. We will move a proposal to ensure that not a single building proposal gets clearance from civic officials if it does not provide rainwater harvesting facilities," water supply minister Laxman Dhoble said on Friday. 

    The first draft rules for rainwater harvesting were framed by the BMC in 2002, making it mandatory for every building on a plot measuring a minimum of 1,000 sq m to instal a plant. But the rule was not followed by many. In 2007, the government reduced the size to 300 sq m. According to recent BMCdata, nearly 4,000buildings in the city were yet to implement the rule even after being offered incentives. 

    When Dhoble's attention was drawn to the existing rules in the civic body, the minister said: "We want the rule to be made mandatory for every housing complex in the city. Also, to ensure effective implementation of the proposal,sternaction willbe proposed against the developer and civic officials concerned for not complying with the norms." 

    The city gets nearly 3,450 million litres of water every dayfrom six lakes asopposed to a demand of 4,250 MLD. 

'Alarming situation' 

    In a press release, Laxman Dhoble's water supply department claimed that the water situation this year was worse than what it was in 1972 and 2003, when the crisis had peaked due to drought. "The government has roped in tankers to supply water in areas where there is a drought-like situation," Dhoble said. He said rivers in rural areas had dried up and a meeting would be held with the CM to discuss the issue.—Sanjeev Shivadekar