This newly released documentary film unravels the secret of Mumbai’s water mafia

Dharavi is parched late for work and brought to a standstill by the lack of potable water leading to unlit stoves and empty bellies The basti descending onto the lone tanker arriving to quench this thirst makes for a stirring image in Naman Govilrsquos documentary Water Mafia Released on January 12 on the OTT platform DocuBay and in association with Vice Media it throws light on water theft by gangs in Delhi and MumbaiWhen he noticed a large number of water tankers taking over the streets of the national capital Govil who is also the filmrsquos writer gave this a serious thought Sifting through piles of research led him to discover a burgeoning black market of water theft and supplymdashpredicted to be worth Rs 10000 croremdashand the nexus of politicians gangsters and bureaucrats that keeps it alive ldquoI knew the businessrsquo market value last year but it was only when I worked on the story that the intricate nexus sunk inrdquo Govil saysLeft Anil Chaudhary director of Vice India Right DocuBay COO Girish Dwibhashyam who greenlit the documentary PicsSatej ShindeCrossing paths with veteran investigative journalist Vivek Agrawal proved instrumental to the project Agrawal whorsquod been gathering evidence about the issue for a decade was kneedeep in details about how money changes hands The Goregaonbased author is also open to sharing the data with anyone who asks or listens ldquoAround 1700 tankers supply water to the city Much of this supply goes to Dharavi which is the worst hit by water cuts and theft In fact the numbers now say that 60 to 65 per cent of Mumbai lives in slums and experiences constant interruptions to water and electricity supplyrdquo says Agrawal who also features in the documentary This estimation is based on figures from multiple NGOs working in the informal housing sector such as PUKAR The last official records of Housing go back to the 2011 Census which found that 42 per cent of Mumbairsquos population resides in slums ldquoEveryone thinks that the water in these tankers comes from the outskirts of the city or from rural Maharashtra but the truth is downright bizarrerdquo says AgrawalNaman Govil and Vivek AgrawalThe bizarre truth is that the mafia siphons water lawfully belonging to Mumbaikars supplied by the BMC at R5 per 1000 litres and sells it back to us at a higher rate of approximately R600 ldquoUnder the cloak of darkness they the mafia drill holes into the massive pipes that bring us water from the seven reservoir lakesmdashfilling tankers up until dawn Then they go to BMC officers in charge of opening the supply valves in an area bribing them to open less than the designated number This could dry up a neighbourhood with five lakh residents Instantly the water mafia has created a customer base Come morning the residents will throng the tanker carrying water that belonged to them in the first placerdquo Agrawal estimates that BMCrsquos loses between R1800 to R3000 per day to water theftCan one unopened valve really affect five lakh residents In the documentary the Urban Planner Vaidehi Tandel from the University of Manchester points out that we are speaking about water supply to one of the densest cities in the world and to quench this monsterrsquos thirst the borewells and lakes in villages beyond the Mumbai Metropolitan Region MMR are drained ldquoIn villages or even small towns 500 families live in a one km areardquo she says ldquobut in Mumbai this goes up to five lakh This is mostly due to mega housing societies that have come up in the last decaderdquoEven though the water mafia has existed for a while and has been largely covered by print media documentaries reach a younger more socially aware audienceWhich is why Girish Dwibhashyam COO of DocuBay and Anil Chaudhary Director of Vice India say they greenlit the project ldquoWe felt that people need to know thisrdquo says Dwibhashyam ldquoUntil we heard the storyrdquo chimes in Chaudhary ldquowe didnrsquot realise that the nexus is as big as Rs 10000 crorerdquoIn March 2022 the Maharashtra government formed a Lokayuktasanctioned Special Investigation Team SIT comprising retired police personnel BMC officials and activists Retired ACP Milind Khetle who was with this SIT until December last year says he faced three major challenges in his term ldquoAt first water theft is still a bailable offencerdquo he says ldquoThey have to bring it under the Environment Protection Act making it nonbailablerdquo Khetle also felt that the legal language and procedure to identify theft is vague and exasperating ldquoWhen water theft is finally reported a BMC official has to go to the spot and pronounce that this was theft and not an accidentrdquo he says ldquoWe faced challenges here itself and tried to work with the BMC Finally we would end up arresting the driver of the water tanker and not the owner of the tankers Tracing and arresting them was one of the biggest challenges given the trail of fake papers uncooperative drivers who would be bailed out before we finished investigation etcrdquoAgrawal informs that once a pipeline is damaged it takes three to seven days for the BMC to fix and restart the supply and ends his conversation with a doomsday prediction ldquoIn 20 to 30 years there will be a civil war between those who can afford potable water and those who cannot The weaker and poorer sections of society will feel even more disenfranchised and eventually this will spill on to the streets This is the inevitablerdquoTanker rate cardRs 4500 to 6000 A potable tanker carrying 10000LRs 2600 to 3500 A nonpotable tanker carrying 10000lRs 300 to 500 A potable water tanker carrying 500l