13L consumers to benefit as CM announces water arrear waiver

NEW DELHI: Over 13 lakh consumers will be benefitting as Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Tuesday announced a massive one-time water waiver for defaulting consumers with functional meters. The waiver will apply to consumers with commercial connections, who can pay the principal amount of their bills till March 31 this year and get a 100 percent waiver on the late charges.

One consumer, particularly satisfisfied with the announcement said that this move by the Delhi government will go a long way in helping his household with the pending bill or even adding new water connections to other parts of his households.

He said, "This seems like a smart move because it is unique way for a lot of consumers like me to start fresh and get on a proper systematic billing cycle from the start."

Under the new scheme, domestic consumers will get a 25-100 percent waiver on the principal bill amount and their late payment surcharge will be waived for all A to H categories customers. There are eight categories (A-H) of colonies in Delhi, based on house tax.

Sharing details, Kejriwal said all principal and late surcharges of residents of the E, F, G and H category colonies would be waived. For A & B categories, 25 per cent, for the C category 50 percent and for the D category colonies 75 per cent of the principal amount will be waived.

What's more is that the new scheme also applies to those who can manage to get their Delhi jal Board water connections installed by November 30 and commercial consumers can pay bills in three instalments before then.

The Delhi government's rationale for this move was that a lot of consumers had built up pending bills becuase of faulty and inefficient billing by the Delhi Jal Board, which the CM blamed on the organisation's legacy issues since before his government came to power.

Moreover, the government also said that this move is expected to get more people piped water in the Capital city. Kejriwal said before he came to power, there were water bills and no water. "Now there is water, but no bill. We have improved the infrastructure and 93 per cent of Delhi colonies have access to piped water," he said. Barring the areas having legal issues in laying pipelines, the entire city would have tap water in a year or so, the CM promised.

Kejriwal said on April 1, 2015, the DJB had 19 lakh connections, which increased to 23 lakh on August 1.