Hundreds of villages and scores of towns in the Saurashtra-Kutch region will not get drinking water supply on April 7 because of a shutdown at Navda and Gadhda pumping stations of Mahi-Pariaj and Narmada pipelines.

Gujarat Water Infrastructure Limited (GWIL), a state-government undertaking that operates the Navda pumping station near Barwala town in Ahmedabad district and at Gadhda in Bhavnagar district, issued a public notice on Tuesday announcing the shutdown on April 7 due to power outage.

According to GWIL, Paschim Gujarat Vij Company Limited (PGVCL), which supplies power to the stations, has sought the shutdown to carry out routine maintenance work and giving extra power load to the stations for capacity expansion.

Due to outage, 22 heavy-duty water pumps at Navda would remain idle on Sunday.

Babu Sorathia, superintending engineer of Botad circle of PGVCL, said that the shutdown was required for their work at Gadhda pumping station only but since no water can be pumped further from there, supply from Navda will have to be stopped.

Parallel maintenance work would be undertaken at Navda and Chavand station (in Amreli district), Sorathia said.

GWIL officers said no alternate arrangement could be made on the day of shutdown for lack of infrastructure nor could additional water be pumped in preceding days due to capacity limitation of stations. "This is why we have informed public well in advance so that they can store water for that day," a GWIL officer said.

The shutdown is likely to hit hard residents of towns like Amreli and Jetpur in Rajkot district which get water once in around 10 days. Junagadh too is getting water once in every four days. Villages of these districts are completely dependent on water supplied through this pipeline network as local sources have dried up due to deficient monsoon.

Courtesy : www.indianexpress.com