Swimming pool at home offers comfort & privacy……..Pankaj Molekhi
Have you ever come home after a long, grueling day at work, cursing the humid weather and stickiness, and secretly wished you could shed your clothes, splash into sparkling blue waters and drown your fatigue, without having to bother about a whistling pool attendant, pesky advisers on the edges?
Today it wouldn’t cost a fortune to build your own private pool, even if you are living in a house as small as 250 sqmt in a metro. “The cost of a private pool comes between Rs 4-8 lakh for a normal size pool,” says Piyush Prakash, managing director of architect group DAAT India. He would know, for his group has built over 100 private pools in India over the last few years. “One need not bother about the heavy upkeep and hygiene maintenance, thanks to the new easy-to-use gadgets,” Amit Bahl, an associate of Mr Prakash, pitches in.
A pool today no longer requires a heavy chlorine cylinder for cleaning, nor a room-size booster pump to fill in and filter water. Besides, there are ozonaters which give the pool water a sparkling look. “The water requires no change at all for years on. Just fill it and forget it,” says Mr Prakash. One of DAAT’s project in Goa, Belmont, is a testimony to this, comprising 44 villas with private pools and a maintenance kit which can be handled by a housemaid.
And buyers are willing to shell out extra for a small water body in the house. Ask Mr Prakash why, and he shoots back a question. “Why do people set up home theatres when they can actually go out to a bigger multiplex?” Without bothering to wait for an answer, he offers himself: “Comfort. Privacy. In your own house, there is privacy and comfort. One no longer needs to fill up forms for a water sports club to indulge into pool activity. You can have it at your rooftop, basement or at your own backyard—literally.”
Primarily, a private pool is a private obsession. But there are other reasons why people are opting for a pool in the house. Puneeta Khanna, whose parents own a terrace pool in Noida ATS, feels a pool is a better place for family bonding than, say, a television sitcom. “Nearly everyday my father and mother swim in it during the season. Over the weekends and on all visits the grand children join in,” Khanna says. “My parents bought the flat when my twins were just born and I think a great motivation for them was to have the twins grow up swimming in their own pool and spend some time with them.”
A pool also adds up some zing to a party at home. “We have a couple of parties a season. The twins third birthday had a Nemo theme. The pool was the main focus and the kids love calling their friends for a pool party.”
“People have higher offload income and they are willing to spend for better fitness and recreation,” says Vinay Chaturvedi, 45, who specializes in synthetic flooring and has been building private pools and spas for six years now. “Initially, pools were merely tanks. Today, it is an aesthetical and a recreational space in your house.”
And the tide is rising from big cities to tier-3 townships. “People who have big houses built in small towns are finding the idea of a private pool very exciting,” says Chaturvedi who was earlier associated with hospitability industry but after getting a chance to build a terrace pool in NCR, realized his calling. “Soon I was building my own pools and spas. Today, I coordinate among civil engineers, designers, and young architects to see my projects through.” In 2009, Chaturvedi’s Indoasian Venture built over two dozen pools not only in the NCR but also in towns like Ranchi, Siliguri, Rudrapur, Sultanpur and Bareilley. “The business is growing, thanks to God,” he smiles.
Mr Chaturvedi is optimistic the prices will come down farther once the production of equipment begins indigenously. “Filters, pumps, even ladders are imported from US, Spain and China. It will take some time for Indian manufacturers to enter this field due to weak logistics. But once it happens the cost will come down further.”
The consumer is already spoilt for choice. “See, you can have a front yard or backyard pool in a big house and a rooftop or basement pool in a medium-size house and a terrace pool in a luxury apartment (read penthouse),” explains architect Bahl. “A backyard pool tops the charts. And it serves the traditional wisdom too by keeping the waterbody outside the living structure, provided you have adequate space. But there are no safety or seepage issues with a terrace or rooftop pool either. We are there to take care of it.”
In addition, today the technology has made it possible even for a small pool to fulfill your needs for the calorie-cutting laps. “A cross-current pool requires no moving ahead at all. The way you walk on a treadmill (stationed at one point) you can also continue swimming and yet not move an inch,” says Bahl. Such pools require a hydro-dynamic fitting to create the current, so that one can keep swimming without any forward movement.
Similarly sea wave effects can be produced in a small pool. However, such additional fittings come at an extra cost. “Although the basic cost of a pool comes around Rs 1,100 per sqft, the decoratory and technological advancements add up the cost. But these fitments like internal lights, skimmers add up to the benefits,” says Chaturvedi.
Civic Issues
While the maintenance issues are negligent, archaic laws have made it mandatory to acquire permission from civic authorities before building a pool, private or public, beyond a certain measurement. The rules differ from one state to another and in some case from one district zone to the other. For example, in the national capital, Delhi Police is the single-window authority for building and annual upkeeping of a swimming pool. “They send over a health inspector before the construction, check out the measurements afterwards to allotted specifications and annually renew the licenses,” say a pool owner who requested anonymity.
However, undersized pools, often recommended by the builders, require no permission or a license. The moment a pool is bigger than a given size, guideline necessities like a life guard et al become mandatory. One of the reasons why private pool-owners are not forthcoming about the details of such facilities in their houses. The expert advice is to either keep the size of the pool under the license limit or get it legally sanctioned, lest you dive into the soup.