Why? Because the majority haven't paid the installments due to the GSCB. And why haven't they paid their dues? Because they don't get the facilities they were promised.

And why don't they get the promised facilities? Because they haven't paid their installments.

As the shall-break-but-shan't-bend wrangle continues, Vimla Parmar gears up for the long trek to a Jain temple or a nearby housing society to stock up on her family's daily requirement of water. This is besides, of course, the Rs 5 she'll have to spend to buy a pot of drinking water from a tanker near the Vadodara bypass.

Even as she does so, she may be thanking her lucky stars the walls of her house haven't come down on her. Niru Vasava says she had to change houses soon after moving to the colony, since a portion of a wall gave in. All residents have to pitch in to clean drainage lines that get choked up ever so often.

``Why should anyone stay in such houses?'', shouts Bharat Gandhi, a resident. Irrefutable logic. That's why more than half the 816 houses in the Nehruchacha Nagar are still empty.

``We were promised all the civic amenities by the GSCB'', say Vandana Gandhi and Devandra Valand. The allotment letters bear them out, promising drainage, water, roads and streetlight facilities.

But that's on paper. The unpaid installments are holding up the no-objection certificates the Gujarat Electricity Board requires to allot legitimate connections for household power and streetlights. ``Only half the houses have proper connections, which were acquired under a special GEB scheme'', admit residents. The others tap power illegally. ``Withholding the NOC is the only way to ensure payment of the instalments'', says B R Shah, executive engineer at the GSCB head office, while admitting they should be given connections. GEB chairman Nalin Bhatt says the problem can be looked into on proper representation. As for water, Shah says the borewell dug for the colony did not yield potable water, while the tanker supply was withdrawn recently after ``some problems''.

Says Vadodara-based GSCB executive engineer R C Shah, ``We have to recover Rs 77 lakhs from them. A self-financed board can't possibly give them facilities without being paid the instalments. No one who has paid the instalments has failed to receive the NOC.''

The GSCB, he says, will be more strict once the colony started receiving piped water, talks for which were currently underway with the Vadodara Municipal Corporation. Civic executive engineer V N Tailor confirmed that the process had already begun.