“The civic administration has made a contingency plan to resolve the water scarcity situation in the city due to the delayed monooon,” Municipal Commissioner Mahesh Zagade said. After the private tankers making money in the situation, he said the water charges from tankers have been fixed and no one can sell water above the fixed charges.

The 10,000 litre tanker should provide service at Rs 600, 15,000 litre at Rs 700 and 20,000 litre at Rs 800 per trip.

“The citizens should produce the receipt if anyone is selling water at higher prices. The PMC will ban the tankers from refilling water from its services,” Zagade said.

The Indian Express had on last Tuesday highlighted that the private tankers were making business from the water made available from PMC water supply system.

Meanwhile, the civic administration has decided to appoint 70 of its engineers to ensure proper supply of water through its system. “Every engineer will control the water supply system of two wards to ensure there is equal distribution of water through out the city,” he said.

The engineers from drainage and building construction department have been diverted for monitoring the water supply system, Zagade said adding PMC Land Acquisition officer K C Karkar will help the water department head Pramod Nirbhavane in his work.

The PMC has also undertaken a survey for alternate water source for borewell and well form where water can be drawn to meet the demands, he said. There are 23 tankers of PMC and 47 tankers on contractual basis that provide water to scarcity area. The powers to hire additional tankers have been given to ward offices.