How Bengaluru homes and apartments save every drop

Bengaluru: As Bengaluru reels under a water crisis, residents throughout the city, both within residents’ associations and individual homes, have been adopting methods to judiciously use water. While many residents reuse RO-discarded water for domestic purposes such as cleaning vegetables, floors, and washing cars, a handful of senior citizens have left the city until the next monsoon to stay with their families outside Bengaluru.

Several apartment complexes and localities across the city have taken additional measures to conserve water by temporarily closing swimming pools and installing aerators, in accordance with BWSSB guidelines.

For instance, Whitehouse, an apartment complex in RT Nagar, celebrated a waterless Holi using flower petals as a preventive measure to conserve water and avoid the indiscriminate use of potable water.

Swati, a parent of a four-year-old child eager to celebrate Holi in the apartment complex, told DH, “It was as colourful as any traditional Holi and safe for children. It also helped us save a lot of water that would otherwise be needed to wash off the colours from bodies and clothes.”

Vidya Goggi, a member of the Bangalore Apartment Federation (BAF), said that her apartment has been practicing rainwater harvesting for several years. According to her, this is the primary reason the apartment is self-sufficient and not yet facing a severe water shortage. She also mentioned that the locality has adapted water-conserving methods.

Kochu Shankar, the vice president of the resident welfare association at Trinity Enclave, Banjara Layout in Horamavu, said that conventional methods of preventing wastage, such as using grey water (water that has already been used in washing machines, kitchen sinks, and bathroom sinks) for gardening and flushing toilets, are employed by several households in the locality. He believes that recycling water in old residential areas with individual houses is a difficult task, involving major modifications to plumbing.

While the Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB) has been encouraging citizens to construct recharge pits and implement rainwater harvesting in their houses in preparation for the next monsoon, a recent survey indicated that only one out of five houses has rainwater harvesting facilities.