BMC plans to make permission must for digging bore wells | Bhubaneswar News
Bhubaneswar: In an unprecedented move, corporators of Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) on Friday advocated for mandatory permission of the civic body to dig bore wells within city limits. The demand, which arose at the corporation meeting, aims to check erratic site selection for bore wells and haphazard digging by residents, agencies and realtors that leads to depletion of groundwater. The corporators also decided that rainwater harvesting for individual houses and apartments will be made mandatory, BMC officials said.BMC mayor Sulochana Das said a standard operating procedure (SOP) will be drawn up soon to establish clear principles for segregating areas where and how many bore wells will be allowed to be dug. “The SOP on bore well digging will be incorporated into the building plan approval gradually. The SOP will clearly state the carrying capacity of which places have been exhausted, and digging should not be carried out. We don’t want a situation like Bengaluru. There are instances where, for every 1,000 people, there are more than 100 bore wells. In apartments and individual houses, the location of the bore well is also important. At times, the neighbour doesn’t know that another bore well is coming up just a metre or two away. This is not a healthy practice as groundwater is depleting,” she said.Majority of the corporators endorsed the new SOP to be incorporated into the building plan approval. “In another sitting, further opinions of corporators will be elicited on how to proceed with the guidelines and what aspects should be addressed to make it development-, environment- and people-friendly,” the mayor added.Recently, BMC planned to construct 10 mega water harvesting structures in the city to recharge groundwater. Work will be completed before next monsoon, BMC officials said. The civic body will take guidance from the National Institute of Urban Affairs (NIUA). The ministry of housing and urban affairs (MoHUA) has provided funds to BMC to spend Rs 5 lakh on each water harvesting structure. BMC has identified the places where the structures will be established.BMC officials a list of low sustainable zones has been prepared where high interventions in terms of constructing artificial recharge structures have been recommended by the ministry following the National Remote Sensing Centre’s survey of groundwater levels in Bhubaneswar.
