C'nawabganj municipality area
Arsenic-free water from next month
Staff Correspondent
People in Chapainawabganj municipality area, one of the worst arsenic-affected areas in the country, will finally get supply of safe drinking water from next month under Bangladesh Arsenic Mitigation Water Supply Project, official sources said yesterday.At present, most deep tubewells supplying water through pipelines to about 2.4 lakh people are contaminated by groundwater arsenic. "We have already installed a deep tubewell by the river Mahananda to pump out 30,000 gallons of water an hour and it will be supplied through pipeline," said Project Director Khoda Bux. He also disclosed that around 30 villages severely affected by groundwater arsenic contamination would be brought under pipeline water supply scheme on trial basis by June. "If the communities show their interest, we are ready to expand the scheme," he said, adding that the scheme would be maintained and operated by private operators, not by municipality authorities, to ensure hundred percent bill collection. Bangladesh Arsenic Mitigation Water Supply Project (BAMWSP), funded by the World Bank, is implementing the scheme under a special programme. According to municipality sources, people of the area have been drinking arsenic-contaminated water. And over the years the municipal authorities repeatedly wrote to the local government to provide an alternative source of drinking water. "In the emergency phase the BAMWSP agreed to instal seven production wells in the municipality for which a power and pump house is being constructed. For the time being, two wells would be in place for safe water supply," said an engineer of the project. Water samples from deep tubewells in Chaipainawabganj were tested in 1998 when the experts found more than 0.2 mg/L of arsenic -- a level which triggers various deadly diseases, including cancer. The discovery, first of its kind in the country, of high level arsenic in pipeline water supply system under a municipality was kept secret until a report published in The Daily Star in April 2001 revealed it. Ten out of total 16 deep tubewells, which now supplies water through pipeline, are contaminated above the permissible level of 0.05 mg/L. All the wells would be abandoned after the new wells are installed. The affected areas include Namangshukaraboti, Nakhrajpara, Durgapur, Kathalbagicha, Haluabandha, Nayansukla and Chandlai.
| 
