WASA pledges better water supply for Penal, Siparia

The Wa­ter and Sew­er­age Au­thor­i­ty (WASA) has promised im­proved wa­ter sup­ply to res­i­dents in Pe­nal and Siparia with­in six months, fol­low­ing a week­end tour of af­fect­ed ar­eas by its Act­ing Chief Ex­ec­u­tive Of­fi­cer, Jee­van Joseph.

Ac­cord­ing to a WASA re­lease, Joseph, along with se­nior mem­bers of the Au­thor­i­ty’s evo­lu­tion team and Board Com­mis­sion­er Tawari To­ta-Ma­haraj, vis­it­ed sev­er­al un­der­served com­mu­ni­ties on Sat­ur­day 28th June 2025. These in­clud­ed De Gannes Vil­lage, Syne Vil­lage, Siparia prop­er, Pe­nal Quinam Road, Sun­rees Road, Bun­see Trace along Clarke Road, and Pe­nal Rock Road.

The re­lease said res­i­dents voiced long-stand­ing frus­tra­tions with the un­re­li­able pipe-borne sup­ply, with some ar­eas re­ceiv­ing wa­ter on­ly once every 21 days. WASA al­so held dis­cus­sions with Gow­tam Ma­haraj, Chair­man of the Pe­nal/Debe Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion.

In re­sponse, Joseph out­lined a two-phase plan to re­store con­sis­tent ac­cess. The short-term goal, over three to six months, is to in­crease sup­ply from once every three weeks to once per week. In the medi­um term, over six to 24 months, the aim is to up­grade ser­vice to three times per week.

WASA said these tar­gets will be sup­port­ed by sev­er­al ma­jor in­fra­struc­ture projects, in­clud­ing:

-A four-kilo­me­tre trans­mis­sion pipeline from Mon De­sir to Fyz­abad

-Com­ple­tion of three new pro­duc­tion wells in Cara­pal and three in Mendez/Pe­nal

-Re­fur­bish­ment of the Thicke Vil­lage Boost­er Sta­tion and Pe­nal Wa­ter Treat­ment Plant

-De­vel­op­ment of five ad­di­tion­al wells in Pa­lo Seco/Los Ba­jos, with a pro­ject­ed 850,000 gal­lons per day

-An up­grade of the Cara­pal Wa­ter Treat­ment Plant

Joseph said the up­grades sup­port Gov­ern­ment’s na­tion­al man­date to de­liv­er eq­ui­table and sus­tain­able wa­ter ac­cess to all com­mu­ni­ties. He added that WASA’s evo­lu­tion will de­liv­er a more re­li­able and cus­tomer-fo­cused util­i­ty.