The availability of legal water connection in Mumbai’s informal settlements under the ‘Water For All’ initiative has proved to change the social conditions of the people by raising their standard of living, solving marriage-related issues and healthy lifestyle, revealed a qualitative study by University of Mumbai.
On Wednesday, University of Mumbai’s Department of Civics and Politics released a report about the impact assessment of access to legal drinking water connection to residents of informal settlements in Mumbai. This study was conducted in collaboration with Pan Haq Samiti, a non-governmental organisation working to provide water access to the underprivileged families.
The study aimed to assess the conditions before and after legal water connections was provided in selected households across informal settlements in Mumbai. These households were a part of the 15,000 group applications that were submitted to the BMC for legal water connections after the ‘Water For All‘ act was passed in 2022.
Through the study, university faculties Dr Sanjay Patil, Ankita Bhatkhande and Ravindra Swami along with 20 post-graduation students interviewed 202 households across seven informal settlements to know the impact of water connection. The study revealed that after these households obtained water connection, family members saw its impact on their health, economy as well as the social condition.
“Many people told us that they are now able to save money which was earlier spent on buying water, they save time spent on fetching water from different sources and gave them relief from medical problems like back pain caused due to regularly fetching water. Having excess water in the house means these people can invite guests and can also think of marrying the single boys in their house, who were facing rejections earlier due to shortage of water,” said Bhatkhande.
These communities say that now they are receiving ‘izzat ka pani’, meaning water with dignity, as they do not have to ask for water from anyone. The study highlighted that women who had to compromise their jobs and education to fulfill their responsibilities around water, are now able to pursue jobs and resume school education. Expenditure on water has also reduced drastically and health and hygiene issues have seen an improvement.
Abhijit Bangar, additional municipal commissioner (projects) of the BMC, said, “Such a study should have been carried out by the BMC but I am glad to have gone through this. I believe that we should be completely inclusive when it comes to water and toilets, without laying any conditions. In Mumbai, around 40% of water distributed every day is non-revenue water. Giving more connections to people is ultimately beneficial for the BMC also.”
The researchers also recommended the policy makers to work on establishing a single-window system to apply for water connection as well as providing drinking water to pavement dwellers, citing that water is the fundamental right of all human beings.
