Kathmandu, February 6:

At a time when the Kathmanduites are facing acute shortage of drinking water due to increasing hours of loadshedding from January 26, Bhaktapur municipality denizens are free from that tension, thanks to the Nepal Water Supply Corporation (NWSC) branch that is supplying water according to new loadshedding schedule.

Chandrakant Marhatta, chief of NWSC’s Bhaktapur branch, said: “We have been supplying drinking water according to loadshedding schedule and informed the locals about the same.”

Earlier, they used to supply water daily, but these days it is being supplied on alternative days by extending supply hours.

The Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) has announced three-hour loadshedding daily from February 15. It has plans to increase it (power outage hours) to six hours due to decrease in electricity generation.

NWSC’s Bhaktapur branch office said it supplies water to 19 wards of the municipality and four village development committees. The office alone covers around 80 per cent of the total water supply. There are around 8,500 taps and about one lakh people of Bhaktapur are benefited by the water supply, according to NWSC.

Marhatta said, “We have generators to supply water but due to shortage of diesel and frequent power outage, they are no longer being used these days.”

“We have two water treatment plants in Bhaktapur which provide pure water to the public and the water is frequently tested in the lab,” he said, adding: “Among the three districts of the Kathmandu Valley, Bhaktapur is the one which provides the purest water.”

“During dry seasons we supply water from tankers so that people do not have to face water problem,” he further said.