While applications for water connections from nearly 2,000 households are pending for the last three months, it appears applicants are unlikely to get relief anytime soon. The Water Board officials said the requests are kept in abeyance since the applicants did not submit the mandatory Occupancy Certificate. And that is precisely where the problems begin, with Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation also to be blamed for the mess.
While GHMC gives OC to owners only after certifying that a building was constructed in line with approved plans, its town panning wing was not even aware if these 1,500 buildings followed sanctioned plan. Municipal officials made field inspections only after the Water Board sent a list of applicants, and then replied that owners of 95 per cent of 2,000 buildings did not even apply for OC. “The Water Board is losing `10 crore per month as hundreds of applications are pending for want of OC,” a Water Board official said, asking, “Why doesn’t GHMC check construction of illegal buildings at the preliminary stage?”
Interestingly, applications for water connections are pending with the Water Board even for three-floor buildings built in slum areas on plots less than 50 square meters in areas such as Parsigutta, Toli Chowki, Hyderguda, Santoshnagar, Pathergatti and Ramanthapur. “These house owners have applied for water connection, but did not even submit building plans because the slum land is owned by the government and most buildings in slums do not have building plans,” another official said.