Despite being constantly highlighted as a major future problem for the entire country, water conservation is a concept that has yet to seep into our national consciousness. The Capital Development Authority, responsible for providing residents of Islamabad with life-nurturing water, seems oblivious to the impending shortage and has taken no action over the gratuitous wastage of an already-dwindling water supply.

Many sectors of the capital are already facing an acute water shortage, but at the same time, neither citizens nor administrators seem to be too worried about plugging the holes in the city’s water supply lines.

A collective public welfare water supply system established by the slum dwellers in F-7. But in the process, there is a small stream running all the time wasting water into the nullah below

Fresh water from the Khanpur Dam flows into a nullah from the main supply line under a bridge between F-10 and F-11 sector. There is also leakage from the valve. This main pipe was damaged with a saw by labourers working on different projects to obtain water. But like illegal connections, the authorities seem indifferent to such tampering of the main pipe.

Not all the leakages are caused by labourers and slum dwellers, however. Many are due to the carelessness of the department concerned of the CDA such as this manhole which houses a water supply valve and is filled almost all the time due to dripping. Here, some residents of the G-7 sector ‘chill out’ during these scorching days.

The shopkeepers and the residents of illegal hutments have established a public bath hidden in the bushes along a main trunk sewerage line in G-7 sector. But they did not bother to understand the meaning of conserving potable water.

Local villagers and shopkeepers take a bath at a broken water pipeline in Bari Imam area.

A leaking joint at the main water trunk in G-8 sector provides an excellent spot for the locals to cool off in the sizzling summer. But the amount of water lost in the process is not accounted for by the engineering department of the CDA.

— Photos by G.A. Zaidi, Tanveer Shahzad; Text by Kalbe Ali

Published in Dawn, July 13th, 2014