KARACHI, March 30: With the rising temperature, the water crisis in the city further aggravated on Friday because of extended hours of loadshedding at the Dhabeji pumping station while the Karachi Electric Supply Company and the Karachi Water and Sewerage Board failed to sort out their dispute over outstanding dues.

Owing to the loadshedding carried out by the KESC at the Dhabeji pumping station about 200 million gallons of water could not be pumped from the facility as bulk lines and pumping equipment also suffered damages, KWSB officials said.

A KWSB media release said the city faced a shortage of 1,000 million gallons of water and many areas of the city were without water.

Water board chief Misbahuddin Fareed also expressed his organisation’s inability to meet the demand of domestic, industrial and other consumers.

The KWSB said the KESC had informed the board that the grid station supplying electricity to the Dhabeji pumping station would remain shut from 8am to 4pm on Saturday for annual repair.

The KWSB said that it had asked the KESC not to shut the grid station because it would completely stop water supply to the city.

Amid the ongoing water crisis, the KESC also rejected the water board’s claim that the KWSB was not liable to pay monthly electricity bills under an “agreement”.

“This is in contradiction to the KWSB’s own earlier stance whereby they had consented to deposit Rs5 billion with the court Nazir,” claimed a spokesperson for the KESC.

The spokesperson alleged that the present problems of the KWSB were due to its own internal failures and shortcomings.

“Previously the board had been ordered by the high court to pay Rs1 billion to the KESC through the court Nazir and deposit a bank guarantee for another Rs4 billion, but it violated the order and paid nothing at all,” the KESC spokesman alleged. In November last year during meetings at the Governor’s House, the KWSB authorities had agreed to regularly pay their electricity bills, but they violated that agreement, too, the KESC official added.

The KESC official advised the water board to abide by the Sindh High Court orders and deposit the “promised cheque” with the court without further delay and pay its bills regularly and fulfill its official responsibility to provide water to the citizens without any hindrance.