Saturday, June 2, 2012

Mantri's sewage disposal issue, a band-aid solution

Having spent much of Friday without water, my first thought on waking up this morning was, 'Would there be water in bathroom tap ?'  There was. PropCare had arranged to transport overnight as much as 35 truckloads of  STP treated water out of Mantri Synergy.  That each truck costs us Rs.800 is another issue that is waiting to explode.  Mantri's, I understand,  have run up arrears in payment so much that  truck owners have served us an ultimatum.
Back to the STP issue , two motors in the plant  burnt out around 11 a m, Friday. As Ujjal Mukherjee (E-803) put it, we don't have proper drainage system, and as Mantri's sewage treatment plant (STP) has limited processing capacity, sewage overflow burns the circuit. This happened Friday (yesterday) morning. To cut back on pressure building up in our sewage tank  PropCare turned  off water pipeline to apartments.
Mantri residents spent rest of the day, and  well into late evening, without water, while the maintenance staff coped with 1)  repair of the burnt out  motors; and 2) hiring trucks to take away water from STP tank. By 6 p m the trucks started moving; and after the exit  of six or seven trucks the water pipeline to apartments was opened (around 9 p m). Sewage trucks moved through the night, causing added disturbance to H block residents (because of trucks getting filled in their backyard).
Irony is, we pay Rs.600 per truck  for clean water we fill into sumps, while it costs us Rs.800 per truck to transport STP water out of Mantri's.
STP's handling capacity can be increased if we have an additional storage tank. Space is said to be a constraint in creating additional storage capacity.  Till Mantri's had with them leased space from the farm next door excess water from STP flowed  into a sewage pond in the leased space. Now that Mantri's have handed over this space, we are left with no option but to pay Rs.800 a truck for its driver to discharge our sewage somewhere out of our sight. The other option we adopted -  letting  out sewage  into the main road. evoked protest  morcha against Mantri's by Padur residents.
A way out the mess is in laying a pipeline along the road to the Padur panchayat sewage system. Does anyone know how the panchayat handle sewage disposal in their area ? This is an area where we, at Mantri's, along with other emerging neighbourhood communities - Rosedale, Akshaya, Ouranya Bay, X-S Real, the Gem Group, the Jains and the Poorvanka's - need to draw up an integrated sewage and solid disposal strategy, in co-ordination with Padur Panchayat. Who would take the lead ?
Meanwhile, would anyone know whatever  happened to a proposal, taken up by the previous PropCare chief Sivaram, for laying a sewage pipeline connecting Mantri's with the integrated sewage disposal system involving the Hindustan University and Padur panchayat ? We have reason to believe Mantri's didn't actively follow up the  proposal because of the cost involved. Shouldn't corporate Mantri be asked to pay for the pipeline? Isn't it time we revived the pipeline proposal ? Couldn't we make this a joint venture pipeline, along with Rosedale and others ?More questions would arise before we find the answer.

2 comments:

  1. Considering that the occupancy is around 400 out of the capacity of 750, it is quite a telling situation for the current residents and future owners.

    You need a governance mechanism ( probably your association) and agreement to pursue legal and PR means to solve your issues with management. I am not sure about the legal provisions for housing residents in india. But good luck though.

    I was hoping buy a flat there but have second thoughts now.

    I like your blog posts.

    Best regards and Good luck

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    1. Sorry to note our blogpost prompted your second thoughts on Mantri's. Would like to say, though, that at Mantri's we strive to build community life based on reasonably free interaction and transparency. I am not sure if you find such discussion forum in reference to residential projects done by other developers.

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