Official apathy hits soak pits construction

Srikakulam: The government’s aim is to protect the ground water level by rain water through soak pits is being defeated in  Srikakulam as the municipal corporation officials are not showing interest and people also not following the rules properly.

With an aim to protect ground water levels, particularly in towns and cities where concrete jungles are spreading indiscriminately, the state government has issued the GO No. 350 for the construction of soak pits mandatory at each and every residential and commercial complexes, buildings and apartments. Due to loopholes in the GO, the owners of the buildings are not constructing the soak pits.

To prevent these violations, the government has issued GO No. 119 on March 28, 2017 by making the construction of soak pits mandatory and correcting loopholes in the previous GO. In the recent GO, a provision was added to construct rain water protected pits at the government schools and offices also.

For the construction of these pits, every owner of the building should include it in his building plan and has to pay fee for it. But this GO also not being implemented properly as public are not serious about it.

In Srikakulam city, 4,000 buildings have been constructed from 2003 to 2018 of them, the town planning department issued approvals for 3,934 buildings officially. Of them, soak pits dug  only at below 100 buildings which shows how the government’s aim is being defeated.

Another, 30 soak pits were constructed at the government schools and office buildings in and around the city so far which covers less area in protection of ground water level in the city.

Due to lack of proper place and other reasons, people are not showing interest for the construction of soak pits, admitted Srikakulam municipal commissioner R Sriramulu Naidu. “We are creating awareness among the people on the importance of soak pits and to change their mindset”, he added.