Stay order shatters Defence View residents’ water hopes

The Defence View locality of Karachi is owned neither by the Defence Housing Authority (DHA) nor the Karachi Water and Sewerage Corporation (KWSC) when it comes to its water supply.

Residents of the area complain that they do not receive water supply from their original water line originating from Qayyumabad due to illegal connections. When the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) chairman of the Chanesar Goth Town laid a new line for the residents, the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) obtained a stay order from the court regarding water supply from that line.

The JI contends that the PPP's new waterline for Defence View would deprive other adjoining areas of water, as water would be supplied from their allocation.

The area falls under the jurisdiction of District East’s Chanser Town, which relies on its water supply from a punctured water line coming from Qayyumabad. Defence View Residents’ Association Chairman Muhammad Imran said that their original water line, for which the Defence View builder had made the payment, had been punctured and water was being stolen and supplied to either water tankers or other areas.

Yusra Salim’s house in Defence View Phase II never received any water through the lines of the KWSC. However, she says the corporation makes sure that the monthly bills regularly land at her doorstep.

Imran said the original line was supposed to provide water to Defence View and Manzoor Colony, but due to corruption in the water corporation, their water was being stolen. “A mafia has taken illegal connections from our line and the KWSC does nothing about it,” he maintained.

A lot of officials mistake the Defence View area with Defence and say that the water supply to Defence View is the responsibility of the DHA. Imran, however, clarified that Defence View did not fall under the DHA and it comes under the Chanesar Goth Town, due to which it is the KWSC’s responsibility to supply water to them.

He said Defence View had three phases and Phase 1 was the most affected by the water shortage. When asked about water tanker charges, he said he had to pay Rs5,000 for one small water tanker and needed at least four water tankers monthly.

“This expense is other than the monthly water bill which we pay to the KWSC,” he said.

He lamented that although residents of Defence View had submitted applications to the KWSC against illegal connections in their water line but no operation had taken place yet.

Shahid Ansari, the union committee chairman of Defence View who belongs to the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) said he had raised the issue in the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) City Council but no one paid any heed.

Due to the District East deputy commissioner’s efforts, he said, they were able to hold a meeting with the KWSC chief operating officer (COO) on the issue, but nothing happened after that. He pointed out how new residential-cum-commercial buildings had been springing up in the area, none of which had obtained a no objection certificate regarding a water connection from the KWSC, yet they were enjoying a proper water supply.

Imran pointed out that the Chanesar Goth Town Municipal Corporation’s elected chairman, Farhan Ghani, who is also the brother of Pakistan Peoples Party’s (PPP) leader Saeed Ghani, laid a new water line for the area from the Expressway, but the Jamaat-e-Islami’s Junaid Mukati took a stay order against the water supply through that line, shattering the hope of the Defence View residents that they would get water from the KWSC’s water line.

The new water line was supposed to supply water to Manzoor Colony, Defence View, Junejo Town and Akhtar Colony.

When Mukati was contacted, he stated the PPP had never provided additional water supply to Karachi from any of the city’s water supply sources. He asked wherefrom the new water line would get water and himself responded: "Obviously from the water supply share of other areas."

He was of the view that with the new water line laid by the PPP for Defence View, residents of Bahadurabad, PECHS, Tariq Road, SMCHS, and other residential societies would be deprived of water.

He demanded that the government increase the water supply to Karachi through the completion of the K-IV project and control water theft, which he termed the root cause of the plight of Defence View residents.

He stated that stealing water from other residential areas to supply somewhere else was not the solution.

While the two political parties fight, Yusra mentioned that their water bills kept increasing every month, yet they did not receive a single drop of water from the KWSC and were compelled to pay hefty charges to water tankers. KWSC's water incharge of Defence View Tanveer Sheikh did not respond to The News’ queries.