Burmamines slum dwellers rue contaminated water supply

Jamshedpur: Over 1,500 people living in five slums in the vicinity of the Steel City in the Burmamines area are confronting clean water woes. The residents are getting contaminated water from the water hydrants installed by Tata Steel Utility and Infrastructure Services Ltd (TS UISL) in each of the slums.The slum dwellers said that muddy, sometimes black, foul-smelling water comes from the hydrants every time they collect water. The water is supplied twice every day to the hydrants in the aforesaid slums.“This problem has been there for the last three months,” said Ashok Pandey, Mukhia of Sido Kanhu basti said on Monday.He added that people living in Das Basti, Vinoba Bhave basti, Vinoba ashram basti, Koyla tal basti and Ram basti are experiencing the same problem.

The residents said that due to the consumption of dirty water, people often fall sick.“Complaints of jaundice and diarrhoea increased in the slum area over the past 3 months,” said Ram Karmakar, Mukhia of Ram basti.The people said that even after boiling, the odour of the water refuses to go away, and they consume the discoloured water regularly.They said that, on the initiative of the then MLA of Jamshedpur (East), Saryu Roy, the company installed the hydrants in 2022-23.

“We used to get clean water until recently; the problem cropped up about a few months ago,” said Binu Behera, a local resident.The contaminated water issue came to light when a delegation of the JD (U) visited the bastis to verify the matter on receiving the complaints.“TS UISL has to investigate the matter thoroughly and fix the problem at the earliest; otherwise, the contaminated water supply would cause a health emergency any time soon,” said Bablu Kumar Singh, President, Burmamines mandal JD (U).In case the matter is not addressed in a time-frame manner, slum-dwellers will stage an agitation at the TS UISL office, Singh said.TS UISL, in a statement, said that an inspection of the site was done today. “Muddy water was initially observed from the hydrant. Further inspection revealed leakages at 3 locations in the existing 100 mm and 150 mm diameter cast iron (CI) pipelines,” TS UISL said in a statement. The repair work will commence on January 9, and until then the hydrant has been stopped. Water through trolley tankers will be supplied to the slum-dwellers, the company said.