It has plenty of drinking water in store. But the public representatives who come to their doorsteps to seek votes during elections, have only failed to exploit these natural resources to meet the drinking water needs of the people of Haldwani and adjacent areas over the years.
The leaders of different political parties who were amongst the masses during election campaign till recently, have now disappeared from the scene, while the beleaguered citizens of Haldwani and its adjacent areas have now taken to the streets against the ongoing drinking water crisis.With about nine tube-wells presently running out of order in Haldwani and neighbouring Kaladhungi areas coupled with poor drinking water distribution system in hand, a majority of the population of this region is facing acute drinking water crisis and there is no credible alternative measures visible on the ground to tide over the situation.
According to the official concerned of the Jal Sasthan, Haldwani, while availability of the drinking water in Haldwani remains about 35 million liter per day (MlD), the demand for the same is only around 28 (MlD) even during peak hours in Haldwani, thus showing about seven MlD drinking water in surplus.
Besides, the Jal Sasthan has also installed tube-wells in many parts of urban as well as rural parts of Haldwani and neighbouring areas, yet the drinking water crisis continues to hit normal life for long mainly because of delay in replacing over four decade old drinking water distribution system.
It is worth mentioning here that with the hope of solving their long pending basic services problems like drinking water crisis, if in the lok Sabh polls of 2009 nearly one lakh voters of the Haldwani assembly constituency played a decisive role in securing the then Congress candidate K C Singh Baba's victory, they accorded a landslide victory to incumbent MlA Indira Hridayesh in the state assembly elections in 2012. Congress candidate K C Singh Baba is out of scene with losing this Nainital-Udham Singh Nagar seat to the BJP in the recently concluded polls. But the drinking water crisis of this area remains same as it was before even in the tenure of MlA from Haldwani and State Finance Minister Indira Hridayesh who has also represented this assembly segment in the ND Tiwari regime.
Yet, she definitely tried her best to exploit the popular support inthe recently concluded lok Sabha polls by bringing in actress like Amisha Patel in Haldwani to campaign for her party. However, MlA Hridayesh taking the drinking water crisis seriously asked the officials concerned to take necessary steps to solve the drinking water crisis soon.Describing ongoing drinking water crisis as a lack of coordination among different agencies, she stressed on the need to have better coordination among jal sasthan, tube-well and electricity departments to smoothen the drinking water supply in the city.
Contribution of the Haldwani voters was not less important in securing present MP from Nainital- Udham Singh Nagar lok Sabha seat Bhagat Singh Koshiyari's victory in the recently concluded general elections. Now eyes of the people of Haldwani are on Koshiyari's promises to work out their long pending concerns like the drinking water crisis as he has promised to expedite work on the long pending Jamrani dam project in Haldwani to solve the drinking water crisis.
When the issue of drinking water crisis of Haldwani and Kaladhungi areas was raised before senior BJP leader and MlA from Kaladhungi Banshidhar Bhagat, he admitted that there are about nine tube wells running out of order presently in the aforesaid areas.
However, when asked about how to solve this drinking water crisis, he maintained that drinking water crisis is definitely a cause of concern as it takes many days to get a faulty tube well rectified. In the present scenario we have to work on a long term strategy like solving the long pending Haldwani Jamrani dam project to meet the drinking water crisis of this region, he added.