Only 10 men to guard city’s water pipelines
Mumbai: THEY’RE a soft target for terrorists. Yet, shockingly, the four massive, 85-km-long pipelines that carry almost 80 per cent of the 563 million gallons of water Mumbai consumes every day are monitored by just 10 men.
‘‘We have asked for about 110 more staffers from the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) and we are hoping to get clearance in a month,’’ said P Savardekar, BMC’s chief security officer, who first sought the extra manpower two years ago. On their way from the lakes in Thane district to Mumbai, the pipelines snake through dense forests, 70-odd villages and areas with no human habitation. With 10 men on duty on two shifts, a single patrolling van and no wireless communication at hand, security lapses are inevitable.
‘‘We are always alert, but sometimes, it might be humanly impossible to reach a spot when needed, as we might be at the other end,’’ admitted one of the security officials.
‘‘We have mobile phones,’’ he added, ‘‘but there’s no signal in 70 per cent of the areas, so many a time, there’s no communication.’’
Of the four pipelines, three worm their way through the deep interiors and can only be monitored on foot.
Then, there are the 70 spots where the pipes pass through villages. High-risk areas where contamination can take place, these areas need extra vigilance.
‘‘We also need more manpower where the pressure valves are located as that’s where most tampering takes place during summer,’’ said Savardekar.
Despite the acute staff shortage, though, Savardekar says his team’s doing a good job.
‘‘In the past, we have caught many tampering cases and now, they have gone down. We have also caught vans carrying detonators that we later found were intended for quarrying. So, we are vigilant,’’ he said.
If the BMC okays his proposal, it would mean more men to patrol, five new vans, and a wireless system.
Savardekar’s confident it will be cleared soon. ‘‘There were some administrative glitches,’’ he says, ‘‘but we have now requested the municipal commissioner to process the request on priority.’’
URL- http://cities.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=198809