Amidst the ongoing unprecedented power crisis, the urban and rural areas of Jammu and Kashmir are now in the grip of acute shortage of drinking water supply.
Taps have gone dry in several areas, while water availability in the taps has reduced to trickle in many areas.
Unavailability of sufficient electric supply at the water pumping stations is said to be the cause of erratic water supply.
The Jal Shakti Department has failed to check large-scale theft of treated water through illegal connections by households in several localities.
Mayor of Jammu, Chander Mohan Gupta, on Monday inspected various pumping stations and appealed to people to make judicious use of treated water.
He said that he is personally keeping strict vigil on working of filtration and pumping stations and trying hard in making them more functional and effective by providing dedicated electric feeders so that in case of electricity failure, the water supply does not get interrupted. Besides this, solar panels will also be installed at Sheetli Filtration Plant on priority basis to make water supply position functional in any case during failure of electricity.
The Mayor said that officers of Jal Shakti Department have also been directed to make alternative arrangements for providing water supply through tankers where there is acute shortage of water and also keep check on the illegal water connections whether residential or commercial.