In line with the Eleventh Plan?s stress on public-private partnerships (PPP) to meet the widening gap between demand and supply of water in urban areas, the Gujarat Urban Development Company is all set to kick-start a 24×7 supply programme in the town of Morbi, Rajkot.
For this, the state government has roped in Feedback Ventures, the integrated infrastructure services company, to design a commercially viable continuous water supply system for Morbi, to be operated through a private sector partner.
The technical and feasibility studies for the project have been done and 10 companies have submitted expression of interest for the project. The request for proposal has also been issued, Suresh Kumar, chief operating officer, India Infrastructure Initiative, a partnership company of HDFC and Feedback Ventures, told FE.
Feedback would also undertake technical assessment to determine infrastructure upgrades required for continuous water supply and demarcation of district metering areas and a survey to assess consumer perceptions on current levels of service delivery, performance of service provider, willingness to pay more for higher service levels and openness to alternate service provider. The company would also prepare a business model to establish the techno-economic feasibility of the project including tariff rationalisation.
On private participation in water supply, Kumar said this was necessary to improve the capacity for water supply and introduce a financially viable tariff to attract the private sector that would look for returns. However, he added that political considerations had emerged as the major bottleneck in the process. He said, to begin with, PPP in water supply would be more of a success in small and medium towns and cities due to their size.
The Eleventh Plan document has noted that though PPP efforts to attract finance for water projects are finding a place, so far there were only ??a few cases??. Till now, TN has emerged as the ??forerunner in attracting PPP in urban water supply sector??, it said, The Rs 1,023 crore Tirupur Water Supply and Sewerage Project has been commissioned, with the cost per kilo littre of water at the estimate stage at Rs 30.The next project that?s coming up is the 100 MLD desalination project for the water supply in Chennai.