Rainwater harvesting pits must for buildings: GVMC

Visakhapatnam: With groundwater levels receding in most parts of the city because of the concrete jungle, the Greater Visakhapatnam Municipal Corporation (GVMC) has decided to enforce rainwater harvesting system for which it would crack the whip on residential and commercial establishments that do not have the mandatory rainwater harvesting pits (RHP).

Talking to newsmen here on Wednesday, GVMC commissioner M. Hari Narayanan said that corporation has decided to make rainwater harvesting compulsory for all buildings. The owners will initially be given sufficient time of 30 to 45 days. The conditions will be applicable to over 5,000 establishments (residential and commercial) having semi-bulk water connection for creating functional rainwater harvesting pits. Rainwater harvesting is the need of the hour due to increasing urbanisation and depleting green cover in the fastest growing Vizag city, he added.

“We are appealing to Vizagites to voluntarily take up the responsibility of having a rainwater harvesting pit to improve the groundwater levels and to construct RHP which is not a costly affair,” Mr Narayanan said. The young IAS officer also requested people in the city to take up plantation of saplings citing that people’s participation is more vital to make anything successful. GVMC has planted about 30,000 saplings in 2016 and decided to plant about 25,000 more in 2017 during the monsoon season, he added.

Claiming that GVMC has been focusing on the public health and sanitation in Vizag, Mr Narayanan said the GVMC has taken preventive measures to check mosquito menace and to control the vector-borne and water-borne diseases. The GVMC has recruited 150 additional field staff this year to better enforce the vector-borne disease control programme. He explained the progress of various projects taken under Vizag Smart City project. “We will soon issue tenders for the command and control centre. Digital classrooms will be provided in 31 GVMC schools.”