Water Resource Management in Urban Context: Potential for Reforms in Mumbai

Ramakrishna Nallathiga∗

Water resources are important component of urban infrastructure which critically impacts on the quality of
life of cities; already several cities are reeling under pressure of its availability in good quality and quantity.
There are inefficiencies in water supply service, which make it imperative to evaluate the options for reform.
This paper features them in the context of Mumbai.

Water Supply
The total water resources available for utilization in the Bombay Hydraulic Area (BHA) are estimated as
7,869 million cubic metres (hereafter called MCM)/year at 95% dependability and 10,439 MCM/year at 75%
dependability. The water harnessed so far amounts to 2,969 MCM/year, while an additional amount of 292
MCM/year was planned to be utilized, which sum up to 3,261 MCM/year. The Municipal Corporation of
Greater Mumbai (MCGM) has an installed capacity of water supply of 3,193 million litres per day (hereafter
called MLD). This comes from the lakes formed in three major catchment areas northwards of the city. Of
this 100 MLD is delivered to Thane, leaving the balance 3,093 MLD for Mumbai.

Water Demand
The demand for water has been increasing with the rising population in the city. In 1991, water demand for
all major uses amounted to 3,930 MLD. In its report, the Water Resources Expert Committee (1994)
projected it for the years 2001, 2011 and 2021 at 3,541, 4,010 and 4,447 MLD respectively. However, the
Leakages are already very high at above 20% in 2001 targeted to be reduced to 16% in 2011 and 12% in
2021. The losses at plants are additional. To meet the future water requirements of the city, MCGM has
apparently made provisions through planned projects. These projects involve impoundment of reservoirs
from the rivers and natural lakes existing in the upstream catchment areas as indicated below. However,
with slower progress made on projects and rapidly increasing demand critical state of water appears not
very far.

Water Pricing
The prices charged for water supply are indicated in the following table. In addition to these charges,
consumers are also required to pay water benefit tax that has been fixed at a flat rate of 12.5 per cent. As 70
to 80 per cent of water supplied exits as sewage, sewerage charges are collected at a rate of 60 and 39
percent of water charges in case of metered and non-metered connections respectively. For
commercial/industrial units, it is 78 per cent.

Situation Analysis and Reform Agenda

 Out of the gross available water supply of 3, 193 MLD, the losses through leakages and other
sources make the net available water supply 2,320 MLD, which also includes 600 MLD water
supply for non-domestic purposes i.e., industry and commerce. The average gross per capita water
supply is 260 litres and the net water available for domestic use is about 155 litres per capita per

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 day (lpcd). The net available water supply higher than the Bureau of Indian Standards (IS) norm of
urban water supply (135 lpcd) does not reveal why there are good number of private water
suppliers and why bottled water is much in vogue. The spatial, temporal and sectoral coverage of
water is still missing i.e., some parts of the city do not receive water; some of them receive it
intermittently; and some sectors have more privilege in accessing it than others. Given the
shortfalls in service delivery, it is imperative to address them through (a) restructuring of the
operations, as in corporatization, (b) outsourcing to bulk water supply agencies and (c) institutional
unbundling to address policy and tariff issues through different institutional mechanisms.
Moreover, there are other regional issues in water management at metropolitan level, for
addressing which a regional water agency needs to be constituted.
 The Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM) is not only service provider but also water
resource developer and monitoring agency. These functions need to be unbundled and transferred
to external agencies and pollution control boards/ community organizations respectively. The
losses arising from leakage through water supply distribution system amount to almost 25%, which
is very high in spite of the MCGM attempts to reduce it to 15%. Also, current water supply network
infrastructure is very old and not periodically maintained. Auditing and accounting practices have to
be instituted to check for the losses and attempts have to be made to reduce the same, through
appropriate technologies of leak detection. This is also tied to the corporatisation of the MCGM in
several aspects.
 Tariff structure reforms are required. Current tariff structures do not promote water conservation
and cross-subsidy through industrial use is very high. Water has the characteristics of public good
that necessitate generating greater consumption benefits, the necessity and luxury nature of it need
to be distinguished through water pricing. Instead of levying a flat tariff for domestic as well as other
uses, MCGM should use telescopic pricing with high water consumption beyond the threshold point
of bare necessity level. Proper and full metering of individual water connections and a different
mechanism for charging slum households need to be placed before this, but the tariffs should not
be rather attached to measures like annual ratable value of property. Water resource budgeting
has to be planned more carefully and charges levy automated using IT and financial accounts need
to be kept separate and be in line with modern practices like accrual based accounting

Ramakrishna Nallathiga, Knowledge Manager

CENTRE FOR GOOD GOVERNANCE
Dr. MCR HRD IAP Campus
Road No. 25, Jubilee Hills
Hyderabad - 500 033 (AP) INDIA
Ph: 91 40 2354 1907 X 147
Email: [email protected]

∗
Knowledge Manager (Infrastructure & Environment), Centre for Good Governance, Hyderabad

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