KARACHI, Sept 8 A sharp decline in the water board's income from its tanker service has dealt a blow to the already financially-strapped utility.

To the utter surprise of many, the Karachi Water and Sewerage Board income through its tanker service has dwindled to between Rs11 million and Rs12 million while it was Rs30 million when the affairs of the KWSB hydrants were being managed by the Rangers.

The city tanker service which remained under the control of the Rangers for over a decade during which all 11 hydrants belonging to the KWSB were manned by the law-enforcement agency personnel was finally handed over to the water utility about one and a half years ago.

Shortly after taking over the control of hydrants, the KWSB bosses with a view to making hydrants town-specific gave the control of hydrants to 18 town municipal administrations of the city.

The purpose of this handover of KWSB hydrants to TMAs was to ensure that tankers drawing water from a town hydrant must supply the water to the same town so that frequent movement of tankers from one town to another could be stopped and destruction of roads because of leaking nozzles of tankers could be avoided.

It was thought that this would also minimise accidents involving tankers.

For that purpose new by-laws were framed requiring owners of tankers to have their vehicles registered with one town administration and different colours were allotted to tankers of different towns. Moreover, the TMAs were required to collect filling charges from registered contractors and deposit the same in the coffers of the KWSB after deducting service charges.

As soon as the decision of making the KWSB hydrants town-specific came to its implementation stage, the number of KWSB hydrants was also increased from 11 to 18 so that each town could have one hydrant each in its jurisdiction.

But contrary to the expectations, neither tankers confined their movement to their towns, nor were the filling charges that town administrations collected were deposited in the KWSB accounts by most TMAs.Worried over the situation, City Nazim Syed Mustafa Kamal, who is also the chairman of the KWSB, gave the task of managing the affairs of hydrants back to the KWSB about six months ago.

However, it is shocking to note that the KWSB management, after regaining control of its hydrants, is earning only between Rs11 million and Rs12 million a month against the Rs1 million per day — Rs30m each month — which the Rangers used to generate when hydrants were under their control.

Describing the situation as mind-boggling, officials in the KWSB said that it was beyond their comprehension how the Rangers used to earn Rs30m a month, under the head of filling charges when only 11 hydrants were at their disposal and the filling charges were Rs73 per 1,000 gallons and why KWSB officials were generating Rs11 million and Rs12 million a month under the same head when it was operating 18 hydrants and the filling charges had also been increased from Rs73 to Rs110 per 1,000 gallons.

Sources also pointed out that when the tanker service was being run by the Rangers, a certain percentage of tankers used to be provided gratis but with the takeover the tanker service back, the KWSB management had stopped supplying tanker water gratis.